THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

PRESENTED  BY 

PROF. CHARLES  A.  KOFOID  AND 
MRS.  PRUDENCE  W.  KOFOID 


Glimpses  of  Europe 


BY 


Hon.  Wm.  A.   Braman 

ELYRIA,  OHIO 


1001 

OF   J.    B.    SATAQE 


Copyright  1901 
by  Wm.  A.  Braman 


To  my  faithful^  true,  and  loving  wife, 

Sophia  E.  Braman9 

this  book  is  inscribed.     Her  practical  common  sense  and 

sound  advice  have  for  thirty-six  years  generously 

contributed  in  making  smooth  the  rough 

places  in  the  pathway 

of  my  life. 


CONTENTS 


The  Ocean  Voyage 9-17 

The  Trossacks  and  Highlands  of  Scotland 18-28 

Durham  and  Its  Churches 29-  34 

Agricultural  Phases  and  Country  Scenes  in  Eng- 

land   35-42 

The  Vastness  of  London , . . .  43-  49 

First  Impressions  of  the  Continent 50-  57 

The  Germans  in  the  "Vaterland" 58-66 

Irksome  Railroading  on  the  Continent 67-74 

Scenes  in  the  Alps 75-  81 

Antiquated  Venice 82-  87 

Venetian  Enterprise 88-  93 

Florence  the  Home  of  Art 94-100 

The  Eternal  City 101-107 

Obsequies  of  the  Dead  King 108-116 

Pisa  and  Its  Ancient  Landmarks 117-124 

Fascinations  of  the  Alps 125-131 

Glittering  Paris 132-138 

French  Heroes  139-145 

Beautiful  Versailles .146-152 

Farewell  to  Paris 153-160 

Windsor  and  Its  Castle 161-167 

From  Warwick  to  Stratford 168-176 

Busy  Birmingham   177-183 

The  Irish  Metropolis  and  Her  Landmarks 184-191 

Killarney,  Its  Scenery  and  Surroundings 192-200 

Giant's  Causeway 201-210 

M309237 


INTRODUCTION 

While  writing  "Glimpses  of  Europe"  for  news- 
paper publication,  I  had  no  thought  of  incorporating 
the  letters  in  a  bound  volume.  Repeated  requests 
that  this  be  done,  received  from  a  variety  of  sources, 
accounts  for  my  making  the  venture.  A  life-long 
friend,  whose  judgment  I  prize  highly,  under  recent 
date  wrote  me  as  follows : 

"I  have  read  with  the  liveliest  interest  your  serial 
letters  in  the  press,  covering  your  trip  through 
Europe.  To  my  mind  they  are  the  most  readable 
articles  of  their  character,  because  of  their  composi- 
tion and  the  information  imparted,  that  I  have  ever 
read.  In  this,  I  believe,  those  in  the  community  who 
have  read  them  as  they  appeared,  will  concur.  I 
believe  you  owe  it  to  the  people,  both  of  this  genera- 
tion and  those  unborn,  to  put  them  in  book  form,  for 
they  will  ever  be  read  with  increasing  interest. 

"I  hope  that  you  can  see  your  way  clear  to  do 
this." 


An  extract  from  a  letter  received  from  a  lady 
friend  says : 

"I  suppose  the  suggestion  that  your  foreign  letters 
should  appear  in  book  form  is  not  a  new  one  to  you, 
but  I  would  like  to  help  emphasize  the  fact  that  they 
are  much  too  interesting  and  too  valuable  to  be  lost 
sight  of.  They  contain  more  that  is  fascinating  and 


less  that  is  tedious  than  any  letters  of  their  character 
I  have  ever  read,  and  I  sincerely  hope  I  may  some  day 
be  the  happy  possessor  of  a  bound  volume,  which 
would,  I  am  sure,  be  a  source  of  perpetual  delight  to 
my  family." 


These  flattering  references  settled  it  that  a  book 
should  be  added  to  the  long  list  which  coming  gen- 
erations will  allow  to  be  buried  under  the  dusts  of 
antiquity. 

Well,  what  do  you  think  of  Europe?  Did  you 
visit  any  country  better  than  this?  were  questions 
often  asked  and  briefly  replied  to.  In  this  volume 
they,  with  many  other  questions,  are  answered  in 
detail.  As  an  educator  along  patriotic  lines  there  is 
nothing  to  compare  with  foreign  travel.  If  a  cog  has 
slipped  in  the  loyalty  of  an  American,  if  he  fails  to 
appreciate  the  superiority  of  the  land  of  his  birth  or 
adoption,  and  is  inclined  to  magnify  the  hard  side  of 
human  experience,  the  winter  of  his  discontent  may 
be  shortened  and  his  atmosphere  sweetened  by  a  few 
months  of  such  education  as  a  foreign  trip  only  can 
furnish.  My  hope  is  that  the  reader  will  add  to  the 
knowledge  received  from  this  volume  by  a  trip  to  the 
old  world,  which  shall  prove  as  enjoyable  as  the  one 

herein  described. 

THE  AUTHOR. 


Glimpses  of  Europe. 

THE  OCEAN  VOYAGE 

FIRST  PEEP  OF  THE  IRISH  COAST— DESCRIPTION    OF    GLASGOW. 


On  the  30th  of  June,  1900,  the  writer  with  Dr. 
H.  S.  Sheffield  and  F,  O.  Williams,  of  Elyria,  O., 
sailed  out  of  New  York  harbor  on  the  City  of  Rome 
for  a  trip  through  Great  Britain  and  the  continent. 
This  great  ocean  liner,  the  pride  of  the  Anchor  line  of 
passenger  steamers,  had  been  chartered  by  Mr.  F.  C. 
Clark,  tourist,  of  New  York.  Mr.  Clark  had,  for 
stipulated  amounts,  entered  into  contract  with  the 
passengers  to  furnish  the  ocean  passage  to  and  from 
Europe,  to  pay  all  railroad  fares  on  the  other  side, 
also  all  hotel  bills,  and  to  furnish  conductors  and 
guides.  His  agreement  that  everything  should  be 
first-class  was  faithfully  kept.  The  length  of  the  trip 
usually  had  reference  to  the  length  of  their  respective 
vacations  or  the  length  of  their  purses.  Fifteen  hun- 
dred people  were  stowed  away  in  the  City  of  Rome 
for  a  brief  period  of  eight  days;  four  hundred  and 
sixty  belonged  in  the  first  cabin,  nearly  as  many  to  the 
second  cabin,  while  the  steerage  passengers  and  the 
crew  made  up  the  aggregation.  It  was  a  cosmo- 
politan crowd,  representing  many  nationalities,  nearly 


10  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

every  state  and  territory  in  the  union  and  all  vocations 
of  life.  There  were  ministers  in  search  of  education 
that  could  not  be  obtained  at  home,  sixty  members 
of  the  medical  profession  seeking  rest  and  recreation 
for  themselves  and  their  patients,  members  of  the  bar 
whose  pleas  were  not  for  jury  verdicts,  teachers  need- 
ing relaxation  from  the  confines  of  the  schoolroom, 
western  farmers,  often  garrulous  and  loud,  prepared 
to  give  pointers  on  raising  corn  and  cattle,  pigs  and 
pumpkins.  This  miscellaneous  crowd  without  excep- 
tion bade  farewell  to  the  land  of  their  birth,  welcoming 
the  bright  prospects  with  high  expectations,  knowing 
that  in  a  few  brief  months  the  accumulations  perhaps 
of  years  would  be  exchanged  for  the  pleasure  and 
profit  of  a  European  trip. 

For  a  student  of  human  nature  there  is  no  place 
like  an  ocean  steamer.  Restraints  are  usually  left 
behind,  and  adjustments  to  the  new  conditions  on 
ship  board  do  not  fail  to  call  out  qualities  not  sugges- 
tive of  amiability  or  unselfishness.  Two  days  were 
sufficient  for  congenial  spirits  to  assemble  in  little 
groups,  and  the  sets  were  more  numerous  than  the 
countries  represented.  Travelers  on  our  great  lakes, 
occupying  spacious  staterooms  and  wide,  comfortable 
berths,  have  but  a  faint  conception  of  the  narrow, 
cramped,  inhospitable  box  which  must  be  accepted 
by  the  pilgrims  on  the  Atlantic,  even  after  twelve  to 
fifteen  dollars  extra  is  paid  for  location  and  special 
privileges.  The  gorgeous  display  of  table  furniture, 
coupled  with  the  attractive  menu  cards,  all  intended 
to  stimulate  the  appetite,  fail  in  their  purpose  when 
one  sniff  of  the  kitchen  disinfectants  is  taken,  and  then 


THE  OCEAN  VOYAGE.  11 

the  unfortunates  who  are  booked  for  the  second  table 
who  have  soiled  crockery,  spilled  coffee  representing 
maps  of  Asia  on  the  table  linen,  are  subjects  of  com- 
miseration. 

How  to  kill  time  on  the  ocean  is  the  potent  every 
day  problem.  Sports  of  every  conceivable  form  are 
resorted  to,  betting  on  the  distance  covered  by  the 
ship  during  the  current  twenty-four  hours  being  the 
most  common.  It  is  on  this  sort  of  speculation  that 
the  slick  gentry,  the  sports  who  follow  the  seas  for  a 
livelihood,  make  their  largest  winnings;  these  gam- 
blers are  easily  spotted,  their  fine  cloth  and  conspic- 
uous diamonds  are  a  complete  give  away  to  their 
nefarious  calling.  Not  unfrequently  they  stand  in 
with  the  officers  of  the  ship,  with  whom  they  divide 
the  fleeces  of  the  unwary  lambs ;  of  course  the  mass  of 
the  gambling  is  on  a  small  scale,  similar  to  the  parlor 
games  practiced  at  home.  Our  trip  across  the  ocean 
was  a  most  fortunate  one.  We  had  gentle  breezes 
and  smooth  seas.  Each  day  was  a  repetition  of  the 
day  previous.  Sunshine  and  bright  prospects  fur- 
nished a  bright  side  and  a  silver  lining  to  every  cloud. 
The  great  mass  of  passengers,  as  soon  as  out  of 
sight  of  land,  commence  longing  for  the  land  beyond. 
In  this  case  there  was  no  serious  break  in  the  tran- 
quility  and  enjoyment,  except  the  thoughts  which 
force  themselves  upon  every  loyal  American  as  he 
takes  the  last  look  or  the  last  gray  streak  in  the  west 
fades  from  his  sight  and  he  bids  adieu  to  all  that  is 
dear  in  this  world  and  becomes  impressed  with  the 
dangers  and  vague  uncertainties  of  a  safe  return.  This 
was  an  occasion  for  the  shedding  of  many  a  silent 


12  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

tear.  In  mid-ocean,  although  sailing  under  a  British 
flag,  our  glorious  Fourth  of  July  was  celebrated,  with 
as  much  ardor  and  with  a  patriotism  as  intense  as  was 
ever  seen  in  our  broad  land.  We  had  the  declaration 
of  independence  portrayed  in  all  its  impressiveness, 
and  the  American  heart  on  board  the  City  of  Rome 
was  fired  by  oratory  of  no  inferior  sort.  There  was 
one  day  when  the  numerous  whales  which  were  to  be 
seen  were  not  permitted  to  do  all  the  blowing.  On 
the  morning  of  the  eighth  day  passengers  were  out 
early  and  were  rewarded  by  a  sight  of  the  Irish  coast. 
Any  land  of  any  color  would  have  been  welcome,  but 
the  beautiful  emerald  green  interspersed  with  the 
golden  grain  of  the  emerald  isle — like  the  land  of 
promise  to  look  upon — seemed  a  paradise. 

At  Moville,  Ireland,  the  first  stop,  the  most  of  our 
steerage  contingent  left  us.  They  were  generally  the 
sons  and  daughters  of  Irish  parents,  who  remained  in 
the  old  home,  while  the  children  in  search  of  some- 
thing better  had  spent  a  few  years  in  America  accu- 
mulating the  money  now  to  be  used  for  the  comfort 
of  their  parents  in  their  declining  years,  or  in  paying 
their  expenses  to  a  home  beyond  the  sea.  The  joy 
depicted  in  these  faces  when  members  of  the  same 
family  were  united  was  touching. 

Landing  at  Greenock,  Scotland,  14  miles  from 
Glasgow,  we  were  treated  to  the  first  farce  of  an 
examination  of  our  baggage  by  a  custom  house  offi- 
cer. Liquors  and  tobacco  in  their  various  forms  were 
diligently  sought  after,  as  Great  Britain  depends 
largely  upon  these  commodities  for  her  revenue.  The 
impositions  practiced  by  the  smugglers  were  daring 


THE  OCEAN  VOYAGE.  13 

and  too  numerous  to  recount.  Our  trip  by  rail  to 
Glasgow  was  typical  of  the  travel  for  thousands  of 
miles  through  Europe. 

English  carriages,  unlike  the  passenger  coaches  in 
America,  are  notorious  for  what  they  do  not  possess, 
namely  the  comforts  and  conveniences  which  make 
travel  in  America  a  pleasure  instead  of  a  hardship. 
You  enter  an  English  passenger  coach  by  a  side  door. 
If  your  department  is  filled  you  become  one  of  either 
eight  or  ten  passengers.  The  seats  on  each  side  facing 
each  other  bring  you  into  close  proximity  with  your 
neighbor  on  the  opposite  side.  If  one  of  your  own 
family,  a  friend,  or  even  a  new  found  acquaintance 
that  proves  agreeable,  you  are  fortunate,  but  in  case 
of  a  brain  fired  with  liquor,  or  a  mouth  uttering  foul 
oaths,  you  must  grin  and  bear  it,  as  there  is  no 
remedy.  You  are  literally  in  a  box  without  proper 
ventilation  and  without  the  utilities  needed  for  the 
comfort  and  convenience  of  the  traveler,  which  are 
never  wanting  in  an  American  coach.  During  a  ride 
covering  more  than  6,000  miles  and  during  the  great- 
est heat  of  summer,  I  failed  to  see  in  a  single  case  a 
drop  of  water  to  quench  the  thirst  of  passengers.  This 
wanton  disregard,  as  you  must  know,  occasions  much 
suffering.  While  some  of  the  countries  show  a  dis- 
position to  adopt  American  methods  of  transporta- 
tion, others  are  as  deep  as  ever  in  the  ruts.  This  may 
be  fairly  attributed  in  a  measure  to  government  own- 
ership of  the  railroads.  On  the  continent  nearly  or  all 
steam  roads  are  owned  and  managed  by  the  govern- 
ment and  are  non-progressive,  there  being  no  compe- 
tition. There  is  no  incentive  for  improvement,  and 


14  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

the  traveler  at  the  end  of  his  European  tour  recalls  the 
hours  spent  in  being  dragged  through  European 
countries  at  a  poor  dying  rate  as  something  akin  to 
horror.  True,  the  countries  of  Great  Britain  each 
have  some  fairly  well  equipped  lines  and  make  respect- 
able time,  but  after  crossing  the  English  channel  you 
will  hunt  in  vain  for  the  well-equipped  up-to-date 
tramways.  Glasgow,  the  capital  and  leading  city  of 
"Bonnie"  Scotland,  contains  about  1,000,000  inhabi- 
tants. It  is  built  mainly  of  freestone,  and  lacks  the 
beauty  and  fine  architecture  of  most  European  cities 
of  similar  size.  It  is  the  center  of  a  great  deal  of 
wealth,  is  essentially  a  manufacturing  city  and  is  liter- 
ally a  hive  of  industry.  The  trail  of  its  congested 
population  is  easily  traced  by  its  squalor  and  destitu- 
tion, in  the  poverty  stricken  portions  the  depths  of 
human  depravity  are  being  conjured  with.  Degrada- 
tion as  the  result  of  drink  is  in  evidence  on  all  sides. 
Red  nosed  women,  blear-eyed,  besotted  men,  confront 
you  not  only  in  localities  where  sin  is  the  thriftiest 
plant,  where  crime  is  hatched  and  low  dives  flourish, 
but  in  the  busy  marts,  where  the  best  people  congre- 
gate, the  evidence  of  drunkenness  is  forced  upon  you. 
I  witnessed  more  inebriation,  more  cases  in  Glasgow 
requiring  the  attention  of  the  police  than  in  any  other 
city  of  Europe.  The  evil  of  intemperance  long  ago 
became  so  potent  in  Glasgow  that  the  authorities 
became  alarmed  at  its  inroads.  Its  effect  not  only 
upon  the  moral  and  social  conditions  created  alarm, 
but  the  intellectual  standards  were  menaced  to  a 
degree  which  called  for  interference.  Laws  most 
stringent  for  regulating  the  drinking  places  were 
passed  and  are  being  enforced.  But  appetite,  the 


THE  OCEAN  VOYAGE.  15 

grim  monster,  holds  in  his  clutch  its  thousands  of 
victims  of  both  sexes,  who  either  from  their  own 
indiscretions,  or  by  inheritance,  have  become  slaves 
through  the  drink  habit.  The  free  use  of  distilled 
liquors,  in  other  words  Scotch  whisky,  is  largely 
responsible  for  this  national  calamity. 

A  peculiar  feature  of  this  deplorable  custom  is  in 
the  fact  that  women  in  Glasgow  are  addicted  to  drink 
nearly  as  much  as  men,  and  that  the  police  court  on 
Monday  morning  finds  nearly  as  many  women  as  men 
arraigned  for  drunkenness.  Glasgow  boasts  of  the 
best  organized,  best  directed  and  most  efficient  city 
government  in  the  world.  Its  72  lawmakers,  or 
members  of  its  city  council,  are  selected  from  its  army 
of  successful  business  men.  Lord  Provost  Chisholm, 
who  has  been  connected  with  its  city  government  for 
thirty  years,  informed  me  that  he  had  never  known  a 
case  of  crookedness,  not  even  a  charge  or  suspicion  of 
crookedness  laid  at  the  door  of  their  city  government. 
The  city  owns  its  public  utilities  and  by  good  manage- 
ment the  cost  of  water,  gas,  electric  lights  and  car 
fares  have  been  reduced  to  the  patrons  and  consumers. 
Great  Britain  has  less  than  three  times  the  number  of 
square  miles  in  Ohio,  while  Scotland  has  about  three- 
fourths  the  area  contained  in  our  state.  The  census 
of  1880  showed  14  persons  to  the  square  mile  in  the 
United  States,  while  in  Great  Britain  in  the  following 
year  the  figures  showed  289  to  the  square  mile,  or  35 
millions  on  121,000  square  miles.  With  such  a  con- 
gested population,  wages  of  common  laborers  are  kept 
down  to  a  low  level.  I  saw  women  in  the  field  digging 
potatoes  for  ten  cents  a  day.  Common  laborers  at 
work  on  the  streets  for  from  50  to  60  cents  per  day. 


16  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

Operators  in  the  factories  were  receiving  less  than 
half  the  prices  paid  for  the  same  kinds  of  labor  in  this 
country.  Mechanics  work  for  much  less  than  here, 
and  all  classes  of  laborers  have  a  discouraged  look 
and  appear  to  be  living  without  hope.  Glasgow  has 
many  traditions.  Years  ago  it  was  the  scene  of 
internal  strife,  of  domestic  and  foreign  war,  of  victory 
and  defeat,  making  up  her  full  share  of  blood  curdling 
history.  Scotland  had  several  heroes,  which  are  being 
remembered  with  expensive  and  beautiful  monu- 
ments. The  Scots  revel  in  the  glorious  record  made 
on  the  field  of  battle  by  her  Bruce  and  her  Wallace, 
as  well  as  the  record  in  the  literary  world  made  by  her 
favorite  sons,  Sir  Walter  Scott,  Robert  Burns,  and 
Thomas  Carlyle.  Glasgow  points  with  pride  to  one  of 
the  very  finest  city  buildings  in  the  world,  to  her 
extensive  and  elegant  botanical  gardens  and  to  her 
exposition  buildings.  Transportation  facilities  of  a 
public  nature  in  Glasgow  are  limited  to  three  miles  of 
electric  road  and  40  miles  of  horse  cars,  that  is,  surface 
roads,  but  through  many  subterranean  passages  pas- 
sengers are  rushed  through  utter  darkness.  The  city 
has  one  immense  cathedral,  built  in  the  fifth  century, 
around  which  the  interests  of  tourists  center.  She 
supports  a  great  university,  where  her  young  men  are 
fitted  for  the  various  professions. 

The  health  of  Glasgow  is  precarious.  The  range 
of  mortality  being  from  19  to  21  per  1,000.  Being  in 
the  same  latitude  as  Labrador,  the  nights  in  summer 
are  exceedingly  short,  twilight  lasting  until  near  11 
o'clock,  and  daylight  appearing  about  two  in  the 
morning.  For  much  valuable  information  obtained 
relating  to  the  moral,  social  tand  industrial  conditions 


THE  OCEAN  VOYAGE.  17 

of  this  old  city,  I  am  indebted  to  our  consul,  Hon. 
Samuel  M.  Taylor,  ex-member  of  68th,  69th  and  70th 
general  assemblies,  and  for  four  years  secretary  of 
state  of  Ohio.  Mr.  Taylor  is  an  appointee  of  President 
McKinley,  and  his  high  standing,  socially  and  offi- 
cially, in  his  adopted  home,  shows  that  the  president 
made  no  mistake. 


THE  TROSSACKS  AND  HIGHLANDS  OF 
SCOTLAND 


EDINBURG    AND    ITS    BEAUTIES— THE     HOME     OF     SIR     WALTER 
SCOTT— THOMAS  CARLYLE. 


From  the  Scotch  metropolis  to  Edinburgh  by  way 
of  the  far-famed  Trossacks  was  a  day's  ride  by 
steamer,  rail  and  stagecoach.  The  Trossacks,  which 
include  lakes  Loch  Lomond  and  Loch  Katrine  have 
long  been  the  subject  of  poetry  and  song. 

The  deep,  clear,  sparkling  water  of  these  lakes,  the 
scenery  which  fringe  the  shores,  the  mountains  tower- 
ing 3,000  feet  above  the  level  of  the  water  abounding 
in  heather  in  all  its  varieties,  the  cottages  along  the 
banks,  erected  for  the  summer  homes  of  the  million- 
aires of  Glasgow,  combined  with  the  bright  sunshine 
of  July  10th  to  make  the  day's  trip  smack  of  enchant- 
ment. 

Ten  miles  ride  in  open  coaches  over  the  hills  and 
through  the  valleys  gave  our  party  a  hint  of  life  in  the 
highlands  of  Scotland.  This  life  was  emphasized  by 
the  bag-pipers,  who,  for  the  pennies  tossed  to  them, 
gave  us  generous  amounts  of  Scotch  ballads.  There 
was  a  flavor  of  originality  or  naturalness  in  this  old, 
old  country  that  was  striking.  The  Scotch  cattle  with 
their  broad  horns,  hollow  backs  and  long  woolly  hair ; 
the  black  faced  native  sheep  with  wool  touching  the 
ground,  getting  their  living  on  the  mountains  among 
the  ever-present  heather;  the  wild  flowers  in  great 
variety  and  profusion,  and  the  roads  winding  around 
i* 


HIGHLANDS  OF  SCOTLAND.  19 

and  over  the  mountains,  gave  a  romantic  tinge  to  the 
day's  enjoyment. 

Beyond  the  lakes  we  visit  Stirling  Castle,  eleven 
centuries  old,  never  taken  by  force  of  arms;  it  was 
sometimes  surrendered  for  want  of  food  or  water,  but 
every  attempt  to  capture  it  by  force  was  resisted. 

This  old  fortress,  erected  on  a  high  eminence,  rises 
1,000  feet  above  the  common  level.  Its  massive  walls, 
covering  several  acres,  are  well  preserved.  Within  we 
were  shown  the  room  where  King  James  killed  Doug- 
las, after  which  he  forced  his  body  through  a  little 
window,  landing  it  on  the  rocks  hundreds  of  feet 
below.  From  the  top  of  the  castle,  in  the  distance, 
though  in  plain  sight,  lies  the  field  of  Bannockburn, 
familiar  to  the  school  boys  of  fifty  years  ago;  even 
young  Scotchmen  today  are  pleased  to  remind  the 
American  traveler  of  the  fact  that  her  Bruce,  with 
30,000  men,  upon  this  famous  battleground  won  a 
victory  in  the  13th  century  over  100,000  Englishmen, 
thereby  securing  Scotch  independence.  Stirling 
Castle  is  one  of  the  comparatively  few  castles  now 
occupied  and  kept  in  order;  within  its  walls  are  many 
relics  of  barbarism.  There  are  great  quantities  of 
artillery  stored,  guns  and  other  munitions  of  war  long 
since  out  of  date.  The  rude  pulpit  once  occupied  by 
John  Knox,  the  great  reformer,  and  also  an  immensely 
long  list  of  interesting  curiosities  which  have  been 
stored  there  for  cent'uries.  The  walls  of  the  castle, 
varying  in  thickness  from  four  to  nine  feet,  the  little, 
cheerless  rooms,  the  narrow  winding  stair  cases,  the 
diminutive  windows,  heavily  grated,  were  not  calcu- 
lated to  inspire  the  tourist  with  envy  of  the  people 


20  GLIMPSES   OF  EUROPE. 

who  lived  in  the  middle  ages  in  that  particular  locality. 
Tales  of  blood  were  related  by  the  guides  in  all  their 
hideousness.  Every  room  in  the  castle  has  a  history, 
suggestive  of  barbarism.  Outside  the  castle  is  an 
elegant  monument  erected  to  the  memory  of  Wallace, 
and  near  by  is  a  great  block  of  granite  upon  which 
thousands  of  culprits  were  beheaded.  The  ride  from 
the  castle  to  Edinburgh  was  by  the  way  of  Firth  of 
Forth  bridge,  one  and  one-half  miles  long,  and  the 
longest  bridge  in  the  world.  It  is  a  marvel,  and  a 
great  triumph  of  skillful  engineering. 

Edinburgh  boasts  of  its  beauty.  It  has  a  popula- 
tion of  400,000,  and  for  architecture,  fine  finish  and 
beautiful  homes  it  has  few  equals  and  no  superiors  in 
Europe.  Its  Princess  street  is  the  pride  of  Scotland, 
while  its  miles  and  miles  of  four-story  stone  flats  are 
suggestive  of  elegance  and  comfort.  Edinburgh  is 
scrupulously  clean.  Her  pavements,  her  parks,  and 
her  public  places  are  all  free  from  neglect. 

There  is  a  deliberation  in  the  business  methods  of 
her  shop-keepers  that  surprises  the  Americans.  An 
American  opening  his  store  as  late  as  eight  o'clock 
a.  m.  would  excite  remarks  calling  out  predictions  of 
ultimate  failure,  while  the  Scotch  merchant  opens  at 
his  convenience,  perhaps  8  o'clock,  perhaps  9  or  even 
10:30.  Edinburgh  Castle,  the  most  conspicuous 
structure  in  the  city,  has  traditions,  historical  wonders 
without  limit.  The  curios  stored  within  its  walls 
excite  a  keen  interest  in  every  beholder.  In  the 
middle  of  the  street,  not  far  from  the  castle,  may  be 
seen  a  marble  slab  which  marks  the  grave  of  John 
Knox. 


HIGHLANDS  OF  SCOTLAND.  21 

Hplyrood  Palace,  the  home  of  Mary,  Queen  of 
Scots,  in  charge  of  the  government,  is  kept  in  a  fair 
state  of  preservation.  It  was  here  that  Mary  suffered 
the  reverses  which  ended  in  her  being  beheaded  by 
order  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  eleven  years  later.  The 
exact  spot  where  Riggio  was  assassinated  at  the 
instance  of  her  husband  was  pointed  out.  Even  the 
bed  occupied  by  Queen  Mary,  the  furniture  which 
adorned  her  room,  are  kept  in  order  for  the  sight- 
seers and  the  English  shillings  which  in  a  steady 
stream  are  pouring  into  the  cash  box.  Edinburgh 
emphasizes  the  tributes  which  Scotland  pays  to  her 
honored  dead.  Judging  from  the  costly  monuments 
and  elegant  memorials,  Sir  Walter  Scott  stands  first 
in  the  hearts  of  his  countrymen.  From  1798  to  1826, 
Sir  Walter  honored  Edinburgh  with  his  presence.  I 
saw  the  house  which  he  occupied,  and  where  many  of 
his  choicest  productions  were  written. 

Edinburgh  has  many  old,  old  structures,  giving 
that  portion  of  the  city  first  erected  an  ancient 
appearance. 

The  church  of  John  Knox  still  stands,  but  most  of 
the  old  public  buildings  are  occupied  as  cheap  tene- 
ments where  poverty  and  squalor  are  the  leading 
features.  From  Edinburgh  to  Melrose  Abbey,  the 
quaint  old  ruin,  is  but  a  short  ride.  A  portion  of  the 
walls  of  the  Abbey  still  stand. 

It  was  first  built  in  the  eleventh  century  and  was 
destroyed  three  times  before  abandonment.  It  is  here 
that  the  heart  of  Bruce  is  buried,  and  the  ancient 
records  on  the  tombstones  near  at  hand  serve  to 
remind  the  traveler  that  he  is  being  confronted  with 


22  GLIMPSES   OF  EUROPE. 

the  memories  of  the  long-dead  past.  The  ruins  of 
Melrose  Abbey  were  ever  a  favorite  resort  of  Sir 
Walter  Scott,  and  from  its  historic  walls  and  the  illus- 
trious dead  that  rest  within  the  enclosure,  the  great 
poet  received  inspiration  which  has  delighted  the 
admirers  of  his  poetic  masterpieces.  Speaking  of  the 
visitors  to  the  Abbey,  Scott  says,  "The  pillared  arches 
were  over  their  heads,  and  beneath  their  feet  were  the 
bones  of  the  dead." 

Abbotsford,  the  country  home  of  Sir  Walter  Scott, 
scarcely  four  miles  from  Melrose  Abbey,  excites  the 
profound  interest  of  all  visitors.  Twelve  hundred 
acres  of  fertile  Scotch  soil,  through  which  runs  the 
Tweed,  was  the  spot  selected  by  this  man  of  letters  for 
a  country  seat  suggestive  of  a  palace.  It  was  here 
that  he  erected  one  of  the  most  elegant  and  most 
extensive  residences  in  all  Europe.  It  was  the  climax 
of  his  pride  and  ambition — the  dream  of  his  literary 
inspiration — to  leave  in  Abbotsford  a  monument 
which  should  endure,  was  fully  realized.  Neither 
money  nor  pains  were  spared  to  erect  in  the  most  sub- 
stantial manner,  and  to  complete  in  all  its  appoint- 
ments, a  structure  which  should  be  a  lasting  credit  to 
his  memory.  This  property  is  preserved  intact,  as  it 
left  the  hands  of  Sir  Walter,  its  architect  and  builder. 
It  is  owned  by  his  great  grand-daughter,  who  realizes 
a  handsome  income  each  year  from  the  hands  of  the 
swarms  of  visitors  that  flock  to  Abbotsford.  Every 
visitor  is  shown  through  the  library,  where  20,000 
volumes  of  Scott's  own  selection  are  upon  the  shelves. 
There  are  paintings,  statuary  and  other  works  of  art. 
Through  the  room  of  curios,  there  is  stored  an  incon- 


HIGHLANDS  OF  SCOTLAND.  23 

ceivable  variety  of  the  world's  curiosities,  every 
implement  of  human  torture  that  genius  could  invent, 
from  the  thumb-screw,  the  implement  for  crushing  the 
human  skull,  and  the  rack  for  pulling  human  beings 
into  shreds,  is  on  exhibition.  There  are  firearms  and 
coats  of  arms,  even  the  oaken  chest  in  which  was 
found  the  skeleton  of  the  bride  who  playfully  secreted 
herself  as  related  in  the  Mistletoe  Bough,  pipes  and 
snuff-boxes  in  profusion.  In  his  writing  room  stands 
the  desk,  the  pens,  the  inkstand  and  the  chair  occupied 
and  used  by  the  great  novelist  during  his  last  days; 
even  the  last  suit  of  clothes  (fashioned  uniquely)  that 
he  wore,  seventy  years  ago,  is  kept  on  exhibition  and 
contributes  to  filling  one  of  the  most  delightful  hours 
spent  in  Europe. 

The  great  novelist  was  a  many-sided  man.  He 
was  not  only  the  leading  writer  of  fiction  in  his  time, 
but  a  poet  of  genius  and  signal  ability.  He  enter- 
tained with  a  hospitality  which  made  him  one  of  the 
most  popular  society  men  of  his  time ;  his  high  sense 
cf  honor  and  pardonable  pride  were  the  means  of 
shortening  his  days,  in  a  Herculean  effort  to  pay  the 
last  dollar  of  an  indebtedness  incurred  through  an 
unfortunate  partnership. 

There  is  a  charm  and  a  fascination  in  being  asso- 
ciated or  in  touch  even  for  one  brief  hour  with  the 
handiwork  of  the  writer  of  Rob  Roy  and  Ivanhoe,  and 
I  shared  with  others  the  regret  of  leaving  Abbotsford 
all  too  soon.  The  devotion  of  the  great  writer  to  his 
native  land  may  be  inferred  from  his  familiar  lines 
which  follow: 


24  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

"Breathes  there  a  man  with  soul  so  dead, 
Who  never  to  himself  hath  said, 

This  is  my  own,  my  native  land! 
Whose  heart  hath  ne'er  within  him  burned. 
As  home  his  footsteps  he  hath  turned 

From  wandering  on  a  foreign  strand; 
If  such  there  be,  go,  mark  him  well; 
For  him  no  minstrel  raptures  swell, 
High  though  his  titles,  proud  his  name, 
Boundless  his  wealth  as  wish  can  claim 
Despite  those  titles,  powers  and  pelf, 
The  wretch,  concentered  all  in  self, 
Living,  shall  forfeit  all  renown, 
And,  doubly  dying,  shall  go  down 
To  the  vile  dust  from  whence  he  sprung 
Unwept,  unhonored  and  unsung." 

Robert  Burns,  or  Bobbie  Burns,  as  the  Scots  are 
wont  to  call  him,  was  born  in  1759  at  a  cottage  about 
two  miles  from  Ayr  and  twelve  miles  from  Glasgow. 
His  father,  Wm.  Burness,  was  a  Scottish  peasant 
"who  wrought  hard  and  practiced  integrity."  His 
little  farm  afforded  but  a  scanty  living,  and  the  tides 
of  adversity  had  to  be  reckoned  with.  Carlyle  says 
that  Robert  was  fortunate  in  his  father,  he  being  a 
man  of  thoughtful  and  intense  character,  valuing 
knowledge,  possessing  some,  and  open-minded  for 
more. 

Robert,  on  account  of  his  unceasing  toil,  speaks 
of  himself  at  sixteen  as  a  galley  slave.  He  was  the 
principal  laborer  on  the  farm,  and  thrashed  the  corn 
with  his  own  hands. 

Poverty  had  sunk  the  family  below  the  reach  of  a 
cheap  school  system.  They  were  unable  for  years  to 
indulge  in  butcher's  meat. 

Robert  was  possessed  of  a  fiery  temper  and  a  thirst 


HIGHLANDS  OF  SCOTLAND.  25 

for  knowledge  that  was  insatiable.  When  a  boy  he 
procured  a  few  little  volumes,  which  he  devoured  with 
avidity.  At  meal  times. he  ate  with  a  spoon  in  one 
hand  and  had  a  book  in  the  other.  He  read  while 
driving  his  cart,  and  repeated  while  following  the 
plough.  While  at  work  in  the  fields,  Robert  says: 
"I  invented  new  forms  and  was  inspired  with  new 
ideas."  Poets  are  born,  not  made,  but  this  was  a  case 
of  poetic  genius  reaching  the  highest  pinnacle  by  one 
of  the  rockiest  of  roads.  He  says  that  in  his  boyhood 
he  was  constantly  inspired  with  the  wish : 

"That  I,  for  poor  auld  Scotland's  sake, 
Some  useful  plan  or  book  could  make, 
Or  sing  a  song,  at  least." 

Cheered  by  a  burning  ambition,  and  borne  up  by 
a  buoyant  humor,  his  early  productions  found  favor 
and  encouragement.  The  success  of  his  first  volume 
turned  the  current  of  his  life.  All  his  plans  were 
changed,  and  he  removed  to  Edinburgh,  became 
associated  with  and  took  a  high  position  as  a  poet 
among  men  of  letters. 

Sir  Walter  Scott,  who  knew  him  in  Edinburgh, 
says:  "I  never  saw  such  another  eye  in  a  human 
head ;  the  eye  alone  indicated  the  poetic  character  and 
temperament."  He  says  further:  "His  person  was 
robust,  his  manners  rustic,  not  clownish."  But,  alas ! 
Burns  was  cursed  with  a  social  trend.  He  inherited 
the  poverty  of  his  father,  but  not  his  correct  habits 
nor  Christian  character.  Of  a  convivial  nature,  he 
took  to  dissipation  to  drown  his  reverses,  which  only 
brought  wretchedness  and  woe  to  himself  and  family. 
He  died  at  the  age  of  thirty-seven,  on  the  day  of  the 


26  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

birth  of  his  last  son.  Like  many  another  genius,  his 
work  was  not  fully  appreciated  until  after  he  passed 
away.  His  poems  afforded  him  but  a  scanty  living, 
and  he  was  haunted  on  his  death-bed  by  fear  of 
imprisonment  for  debt. 

Burns  could  hardly  make  money  enough  to 
afford  a  poor  living,  but  he  could  make  poetry  that 
elevated  him  to  the  highest  plane  of  poetical  geniuses. 
The  little  cottage  out  on  the  farm,  where  a  good  share 
of  his  life  was  spent,  was  covered  with  vines,  and  roses 
were  blooming  under  the  front  windows;  the  broad, 
old-fashioned  fireplace  and  some  pieces  of  carved 
furniture  gave  the  modest  little  home  an  air  of  com- 
fort; the  sixpences  received  from  the  tourists  during 
the  year  for  an  inspection  of  the  hallowed  spot,  aggre- 
gate a  large  sum. 

Burns  is  idolized  by  his  native  countrymen,  and 
monuments  to  his  memory  are  frequent.  Inside  of  his 
costly  monument  at  Edinburgh  I  saw  much  of  his 
original  manuscript,  as  well  as  a  large  collection  of 
curios  selected  by  himself.  There  was  also  his  gun, 
knife  and  fork,  snuff-box,  pipes,  etc. 

Thomas  Carlyle,  one  of  the  brainiest  of  all  literary 
characters,  was  born  in  Dumfreshire,  Scotland,  in 
1795  and  died  in  1881.  Carlyle  studied  for  the  min- 
istry, but  his  religious  views  precluded  him  from  the 
pulpit  of  the  Scottish  church,  and  he  embraced  litera- 
ture as  a  profession.  His  "Sartor  Resartus,"  his 
"History  of  the  French  Revolution/'  and  his  contribu- 
tions to  the  leading  magazines,  gave  him  a  world- 
wide notoriety  as  a  man  of  letters,  and  a  literary  star 
of  the  first  magnitude.  As  a  writer  of  force  and  genius 


HIGHLANDS  OF  SCOTLAND.  27 

Scotland  never  produced  a  greater,  but  unfortunately 
a  bad  stomach  and  a  few  bad  disappointments  made 
him  a  pessimist.  He  saw  the  world  through  smoked 
or  clouded  glasses,  and  his  satire  and  sarcasm  indi- 
cated that  he  was  on  bad  terms  with  himself.  For 
intellectual  scope,  however,  profound  judgment  and 
force  of  expression,  Carlyle  was  without  a  peer.  His 
industry  and  intellectual  application  equipped  him  for 
literary  warfare.  His  use  of  meat-axe  rhetoric  made 
him  a  terror  to  his  enemies,  which  were  multiplied  by 
his  skillful  thrusts.  Unlike  Walter  Scott,  Carlyle 
lacked  diplomacy.  With  the  face  and  the  tempera- 
ment of  a  dyspeptic,  his  talent  was  often  a  source  of 
weakness.  Clear-headed,  honest  and  fearless,  he 
attracted  by  his  brilliancy,  while  his  cold,  morose  for- 
bidding face  repelled  many  of  his  would-be  friends. 
Had  the  intellect  of  Carlyle  found  lodgment  in  a 
broad,  generous  nature,  had  he  been,  like  Sir  Walter, 
a  good  entertainer'  instead  of  leading  a  secluded, 
retired  kind  of  life,  he  would  have  been  the  idol  of 
Scotland  while  living,  instead  of  the  admired  (with  a 
qualification)  after  death.  Such  keen  gifts  of  percep- 
tion, such  singularly  forcible  diction  as  his,  rarely 
becomes  the  asset  of  any  writer.  Monuments  to  his 
memory  are  conspicuous  in  all  the  leading  cities  of 
Scotland. 

For  three  hundred  years  Scotland  was  under  the 
domination  of  Rome ;  a  part  of  this  period  was  during 
the  reign  of  Julius  Caesar.  The  Scots  were  originally 
Irish  Celts.  The  peculiar  dialects  of  the  Highlanders 
was  and  is  a  sort  of  confused  mixture  of  the  Gallic, 
the  Pict  and  English  tongues.  Properly  analyzed, 


28  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

this  language  might  be  termed  a  neighborly  com- 
promise. The  middle  ages  witnessed  in  the  highlands 
a  condition  of  semi-barbarism,  but  after  the  fourteenth 
century  there  was  improvement,  and  a  higher  plane 
of  civilization  was  reached.  A  race  of  sturdy,  resolute 
people  has  been  cultivated  and  perpetuated.  The 
Highlanders  take  great  pride  in  their  traditions  and 
historical  achievements.  Loyal  to  their  government 
and  true  to  their  instincts  as  a  nation,  the  Scotch 
people,  in  point  of  honesty  and  integrity,  stand  high. 
The  physical  conditions  of  Scotland  take  a  wide 
range.  The  lowlands  are  generally  rich  and  produc- 
tive of  grass,  oats,  potatoes  and  all  root  crops,  while 
the  highlands  afford  p'asture  for  sheep  and  goats. 
There  are  large  tracts  which  produce  little  besides 
heather,  and  are  practically,  worthless,  except  for 
minerals,  and  for  peat,  which  is  used  for  fuel.  The 
scenery  in  the  different  belts,  of  territory  is  in  marked 
contrast,  but  as  a  rule  is  striking  and  beautiful.  The 
population  of  Scotland  is  unevenly  distributed,  from 
twelve  persons  to  the  square  mile  as  a  minimum  in  the 
highlands  to  ten  hundred  and  twenty-six  as  a  maxi- 
mum in  the  manufacturing  districts,  covers  the  range. 
The  manufacture  of  iron  and  iron  products  leads  all 
others  in  Scotland. 

The  rural  economy  observed  is  about  the  same  as 
the  other  countries  of  Britain.  The  good  health,  out- 
side of  cities,  and  low  death  rate  is  attributed  to  almost 
universal  use  of  oatmeal  and  the  small  variety  com- 
posing daily  diet.  There  is  little  of  undermining  of 
health  and  vigor  with  luxurious  living.  An  inheri- 
tance of  poverty  has  guaranteed  the  Highlanders 
against  such  excesses  as  are  apt  to  follow  in  the  train 
of  large  wealth. 


DURHAM    AND    ITS    CHURCHES 


QUAINT   OLD   YORK— COMMERCIAL  PETERBOROUGH— WHAT   ENG- 
LAND HAS  STOOD   FOR,  FOR  THE  LAST  500  YEARS. 


Out  of  Scotland  into  old  England  the  rich  Scottish 
brogue  is  left  behind,  or  exchanged  for  the  numerous 
dialects  which  one  hears  in  even  a  short  trip  through 
England,  and  then  there  is  a  noticeable  difference  in 
the  gait  of  the  inhabitants.  The  erect  form  and  the 
elastic  step  of  Edinburgh  is  almost  lost  sight  of  in 
Durham,  where  the  swinging  gait  predominates,  and 
the  majority  of  men  seem  as  old  at  forty  as  they  ought 
to  appear  at  fifty. 

Our  train  brought  no  coals  to  New  Castle,  but  our 
clothes  were  saturated  with  coal  smoke  and  more  or 
less  coated  with  coal  dust,  as  we  pulled  out  of  the 
murky,  sooty,  begrimed  city. 

Our  next  stop  in  England  was  at  the  old  city  of 
Durham,  located  in  one  of  the  most  northern  shires  in 
England.  The  landscapes  as  seen  from  the  railroad 
were  not  calculated  to  impress  the  stranger  favorably 
who  had  pictured  England  as  a  paradise.  In  the 
valleys  there  were  evidences  of  fertility,  in  the  good 
crops  of  wheat  and  grass,  but  the  most  of  the  land  was 
broken,  ranging  from  high  hills  to  mountains,  with 
black,  naked,  barren  regions,  the  elevations  ranging 
from  1,000  to  2,200  feet  above  the  sea.  Some  of  these 
extensive  tracts  are  rich  in  minerals,  the  limestone 
being  the  most  extensive  and  productive  in  the  king- 
dom. In  the  productive  portions  of  the  county 


30  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

Durham  cattle  were  numerous;  the  cows  are  said  to 
be  the  best  milk-producers  in  the  country.  Mutton 
breeds  of  sheep  are  kept  by  the  farmers/ 

The  city  of  Durham,  fourteen  miles  south  of  New 
Castle,  in  ancient  days  was  a  small  Roman  camp,  but 
the  city  proper  dates  only  from  the  tenth  century.  It 
is  remarkable  for  its  prodigal  expenditures  and  the 
erection  of  its  churches,  and  its  great  cathedral  built 
by  the  Normans.  t  This  cathedral,  which  from  time  to 
time  has  received  important  additions,  is  507  feet  in 
length  by  200  in  extreme  breadth,  with  a  central 
tower  214  feet  in  height  and  two  smaller  ones  138  feet 
high.  It  has  nine  altars,  and  contains  a  variety  of 
curious  and  interesting  printed  books  and  MS.  which 
have  been  preserved  from  the  eleventh  century.  The 
churches  and  cathedrals  of  those  old  days  were  not 
only  expensive  affairs,  but  the  records  show  that  their 
maintenance  was  along  the  most  extravagant  lines, 
the  salary  of  a  bishop  being  an  enormous  sum,  and 
even  as  late  as  the  eighteenth  century  his  income  was 
fixed  at  $40,000  per  annum,  and  the  total  cost  of 
church  maintenance  per  year  as  late  as  1834  was 
$185,000.  Beside  the  cathedral,  Durham  has  seven 
parish  churches,  all  Protestant.  The  city  contains  but 
two  manufactories  of  importance,  a  carpet  factory  and 
a  large  mill  for  the  preparation  of  mustard. 

The  population  of  Durham  is  only  about  15,000, 
but  its  expenditures  for  public  worship  would  not  be 
warranted  in  any  American  city  having  100,000 
inhabitants.  There  has  been  an  evident  decline  in 
both  wealth  and  population  during  the  last  two  cen- 
turies. The  high  banks  of  the  river,  which  we  crossed 


DURHAM  AND  ITS  CHURCHES.  31 

to  reach  the  heart  of  the  city,  including  the  cathedral, 
were  richly  wooded  and  picturesque.  Along  these 
banks  were  well-kept  paths,  an  old  castle,  old  houses 
of  ancient  architecture,  and  terraced  gardens,  giving 
that  portion  of  the  city  a  unique  appearance  and 
eliminating  all  impressions  of  anything  modern  or 
up-to-date.  Both  the  cathedral  and  the  castle  were 
made  targets  of  by  the  guns  of  Oliver  Cromwell  in 
the  16th  century. 

York,  a  quaint  old  city  encircled  in  high  walls  first 
erected  by  the  Romans,  is  a  wonder  to  all  strangers. 
The  delightful  irregularity  of  its  streets,  the  odd  archi- 
tecture of  its  old,  old  buildings,  the  abstracted  infor- 
mality of  the  business  places  as  having  been  perpet- 
uated for  many  centuries,  furnish  an  open  door  to 
mysteries  worth  studying.  Right  in  the  center  of  the 
city  I  rode  through  a  street  barely  wide  enough  for  a 
single  carriage,  overhead  the  grim  old  bricks  forming 
the  fronts  of  the  blocks,  almost  touched  each  other. 
As  these  single  tracked  streets  admitted  of  no  teams 
moving  in  opposite  directions,  progress  was  neces- 
sarily slow.  The  entire  caravan  must  wait  while  the 
close-fisted  housewife  bargained  for  a  paper  of  pins,  a 
bunch  of  lettuce,  or  a  sheep's  head ;  besides  the  neigh- 
borhood gossip  must  not  suffer  absolute  neglect. 
Generations  have  come  and  gone,  and  yet  these 
ancient  fortresses  seem  to  go  on  forever.  To  my 
question  on  entering  a  little  eating  house,  "How  long 
has  this  been  occupied  for  this  purpose?"  came  the 
reply,  "I  don't  know,  sir;  I  do  know  that  it  has  been  a 
public  'ouse  for  two  hundred  years,  though."  We 
were  shown  the  first  Parliament  house  built  in  1160, 


32  GLIMPSES   OF  EUROPE. 

the  birthplace  of  Constantine,  and  the  spot  where  the 
notorious  Dick  Turpin  knocked  a  man  down  and  was 
arrested  and  executed  for  a  murder  committed  in 
London  but  a  few  hours  before.  This  unique  old  city 
has  100,000  inhabitants,  a  majority  of  whom  derive 
their  support  from  the  railroads;  of  course  it  has  a 
cathedral,  with  the  usual  attraction.  Our  cab  driver 
let  out  a  sigh  for  another  Oliver  Cromwell  to  reform 
some  of  the  dogmas  of  the  present  day. 

Peterborough,  a  city  of  something  more  than 
20,000  inhabitants,  chiefly  located  in  Northampton- 
shire on  the  river  Nene,  is  seventy-six  miles  north  of 
London,  by  the  Great  Northern  Railway.  This  was 
our  last  stop  before  entering  London.  Built  along 
the  river  on  the  north  side,  the  streets  are  broad  and 
straight,  and  contained  many  fine  buildings.  The 
first  bridge  over  the  Nene  was  erected  in  1140,  and 
the  last  in  1872.  The  cathedral  of  St.  Peter  is  the 
third  church  that  has  occupied  the  present  site,  the 
first  one  being  built  in  1656  and  destroyed  by  the 
barbarous  Danes  in  1670.  The  present  cathedral  was 
one  hundred  and  twenty  years  in  building,  and  is  one 
of  the  three  Norman  cathedrals  left  standing  in  the 
kingdom.  The  peculiar  features  of  the  present  build- 
ing gives  it  an  architectural  interest,  though  hardly 
entitled  to  a  place  among  cathedrals  of  first  rank. 
The  extreme  length  of  the  building  is  471  feet  and 
breadth  156  feet.  Cromwell's  soldiers,  in  the  16th 
century,  made  a  wreck  of  the  property,  by  destroying 
the  brass  monument,  burning  the  ancient  records, 
leveling  the  altar  and  screen,  defacing  the  windows 
and  demolishing  the  cloisters.  A  portion  of  the  cathe- 


DURHAM  AND  ITS  CHURCHES.  33 

dral  .was  taken  down  later  to  repair  the  damage  done 
by  the  soldiers.  The  remains  of  Mary,  Queen  of  Scots, 
were  here  interred  in  1857,  but  twenty-five  years  later 
were  removed  to  Westminster  Abbey. 

Peterborough  is  a  commercial  city  of  some  impor- 
tance. It  sustains  a  large  live  stock  market,  where 
cattle,  sheep  and  swine  are  purchased  for  London. 
Its  educational  establishments  include  a  training  col- 
lege for  schoolmasters,  a  charity  school  established  in 
1721.  It  has  also  benevolent  institutions  including  a 
dispensary  infirmary,  almshouses,  and  a  union  work- 
house. A  large  trade  in  corn,  coal,  and  timber  is 
carried  on.  Its  principal  manufacture  is  in  imple- 
ments of  various  kinds.  Like  Durham,  the  investment 
per  capita  in  its  public  buildings  is  largely  in  excess  of 
similar  outlays  in  this  country.  With  an  established 
church,  and  a  thousand  years  for  collecting  tithes,  a 
show  of  capital  in  church  property  was  bound  to 
result. 

During  the  three  hundred  years  that  England  was 
under  Roman  domination  she  was  treated  by  her 
rulers  as  islanders,  belonging  to  another  world.  For 
a  long  period  after  being  relieved  from  the  Roman 
yoke  her  fortunes  hung  in  the  balance.  War  of  con- 
quest or  of  defence  was  almost  unceasing.  She  was 
overrun  by  the  Danes,  and  her  internal  strifes  were 
hardly  less  bloody.  Teutonic  blood  upon  her  soil  was 
victorious,  and  the  progeny  of  the  Teutons  have  in  a 
marked  degree  given  character  to,  and  shaped  the 
destinies  of  the  English  people. 

To  write  a  history  of  England  covering  the  last 
eleven  hundred  years  would  be  to  write  a  history  of 


34  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

civilization  and  its  marvelous  march,  with  all  that 
pertains  to  growth  of  intellectual  power,  of  wisdom, 
of  raising  mankind  to  higher  levels,  of  the  advance- 
ment of  religious  freedom,  of  elimination  of  savagery 
and  cruelty,  and  of  humane  treatment  of  the  van- 
quished and  the  promotion  of  better  home  life  and 
better  systems  of  government.  In  all  of  these,  and  in 
many  others  of  a  similar  character,  England,  for  the 
past  five  hundred  years,  has  been  a  leader,  and  the 
most  conspicuous  in  this  work  of  any  government  or 
people.  Her  enterprise  and  her  wars  of  conquest  have 
added  to  her  possessions  in  a  degree  that  has  kept  her 
in  the  front  rank  as  regards  wealth  and  power. 


AGRICULTURAL   PHASES   AND    COUNTRY 
SCENES  IN  ENGLAND 


LONDON  A   WORLD   BY   ITSELF— WESTMINSTER   ABBEY— LONDON 

TOWER. 


Before  entering  London,  a  few  words  regarding 
the  agricultural  phases  and  landscapes  of  Great 
Britain.  Scotland  and  England  proved  a  delightful 
surprise.  The  deep  fertility  of  the  most  of  its  soil,  es- 
pecially the  low  lands,  the  systematic  methodical  pro- 
cesses of  the  farmers,  the  bountiful  crops  of  wheat, 
oats,  barley,  hay  and  the  various  root  crops,  were  a 
revelation.  Unlike  America  the  British  isles  are  com- 
paratively free  from  drought.  Nature  deals  bounti- 
fully with  her  moisture  during  the  entire  year,  and  the 
living  green  of  her  fields  is  a  joy  forever.  The  most  of 
the  country  through  both  Scotland  and  England  has  a 
finished  appearance.  The  fields  are  usually  small,  the 
walls  separating  them  are  in  fine  repair,  the  roads  are 
all  narrow  and  perfect  in  their  construction,  and  the 
live  stock  without  exception  is  well  bred  and  well  fed. 
There  is  no  haphazard  farming  in  Great  Britain ;  crops 
do  not  come  by  chance,  but  by  the  pursuit  and  by 
virtue  of  well  settled,  well  established  principles. 
Opportunities  for  domestic  enjoyment  in  the  rural 
districts  of  Great  Britain  are  almost  unlimited  as 
relates  to  the  well-to-do  classes.  There  are  thousands 
of  fine  old  estates  which  seem  to  offer  every  comfort 
that  heart  could  wish.  The  residences  are  usually 
located  on  an  eminence  commanding  complete  view 


36  GLIMPSES   OF  EUROPE. 

of  the  broad  acres  under  cultivation.  There  are  no  rail 
fences  to  mar  the  beauty  of  the  landscapes.  Pastures 
without  numerous  shade  trees  are  an  exception,  and 
a  dense  grove  of  forest,  fruit  and  ornamental  trees  near 
the  country  seat  is  the  rule.  Instead  of  the  large  bank 
barns  to  be  found  in  our  best  agricultural  districts, 
groups  of  stacks,  ranging  from  five  to  thirty  in  num- 
ber, all  skillfully  and  carefully  thatched,  are  in  evi- 
dence as  proof  of  the  high  prices  of  building  material 
and  low  price  of  labor.  A  long  letter  could  be  written 
giving  methods  for  converting  the  crops  of  hay  and 
straw  into  fertilizer  of  approved  quality,  of  its  effect 
upon  the  meadows  producing  three  to  four  tons  of 
hay  per  acre  for  fifty  successive  years,  but  space 
forbids.  Many  a  lesson  could  be  taken  in  the  British 
Isles  with  profit  to  American  agriculturists. 

Our  locomotive  had  a  long  pull  through  the 
suburbs  of  London,  there  were  miles  and  miles  and 
acres  and  acres  of  brick  tenement  houses  as  near  alike 
as  two  peas  in  a  pod.  From  the  depot  where  we 
landed  it  was  three  miles  to  Westminster  Palace  (our 
hotel)  and  covering  this  distance  gave  us  but  a  faint 
conception  of  the  vastness  of  London  with  its  five  or 
six  million  inhabitants  and  the  greatest  city  of 
the  world.  London,  in  fact,  is  a  world  of  itself. 
It  seems  like  an  aggregation  of  large  cities.  You 
can  ride  for  days  and  days,  from  center  to  center 
of  population.  You  may  keep  going  until  you  think 
you  are  acquainted  with  its  highways  and  byways, 
only  to  find  that  you  have  just  begun.  London  moves 
its  population  mainly  with  omnibuses  and  cabs,  one 
bus  company  owning  8,000  horses  with  busses  enough 


AGRICULTURAL  PHASES  IN  ENGLAND.  37 

carrying  twenty-six  persons,  sixteen  on  top  and  ten 
inside,  to  employ  them.  The  horses  are  the  best  that 
money  will  buy  for  this  purpose,  each  driver  has  six 
teams  allotted  him,  which  work  from  two  to  two  and 
a  half  hours  a  day,  the  bus  fare  being  from  two  to  four 
cents  of  American  money  for  each  passenger  accord- 
ing to  the  distance  traveled.  All  horses  have  free  rein 
and  wear  as  little  harness  as  possible.  Many  of  them 
are  from  Chicago,  and  gray  is  the  predominating 
color.  The  subterranean  roads  of  the  city,  both 
trolley  and  steam  cars,  do  an  immense  business. 
London,  unlike  New  York,  has  no  sky-scrapers ;  there 
is  a  striking  uniformity  in  the  height  and  architecture 
of  her  business  properties.  The  thing  perhaps  which 
makes  the  deepest  impression  on  a  stranger  in  the 
great  city  is  the  living,  moving  swarms  of  humanity 
to  be  seen  on  the  leading  business  streets.  Who  they 
are  and  where  they  are  going  is  a  constant  wonder- 
ment. That  there  are  numberless  places  to  go  is 
patent  to  every  stranger.  The  cheapest  thing  in 
London  is  a  ride  in  one  of  these  "Tuppenny  Busses." 
If,  after  ascending  its  corkscrew  staircase  in  the  rear 
of  the  huge  affair,  you  are  so  fortunate  as  to  find  an 
empty  seat  near  the  driver,  a  flood  of  information 
always  on  tap  can  be  obtained  for  a  nimble  sixpence. 
From  the  fearful  experience  of  a  London  fog  to 
the  horrors  of  Whitechapel,  the  dangers  of  a  night 
excursion  through  Drury  Lane  or  John  street  or  the 
gorgeous  displays  during  Christmas  week  to  be  seen 
in  Fleet  street  or  the  Strand,  or  any  other  lines  of 
information,  pump  the  driver  to  your  heart's  content. 
When  limbered  up  he  is  a  fund  of  information,  an 


38  GLIMPSES   OF  EUROPE. 

encyclopaedia  eclipsing  all  guide  books,  not  excepting 
Baedecker's.  Human  endurance  is  hardly  a  match  for 
an  investment  of  an  English  shilling  in  two  penny 
rides.  In  Chicago  or  New  York  a  "Bus"  conductor 
collects  fifty  cents  for  a  ride  from  the  depot  to  your 
hotel.  In  London  you  could,  for  fifty  cents,  ride  from 
morning  till  night.  But  the  endless  panorama  as 
viewed  from  these  elevated  seats  is  a  continuous  feast. 
There  is  the  contrast  between  disorder,  squalor,  con- 
fusion, chaos  and  misrule,  and  wealth,  elegance,  bril- 
liancy and  all  that  equips  and  characterizes  royalty. 
Poverty,  misery,  plenty  and  luxury  are  in  close  prox- 
imity. But  a  stone's  throw  from  the  highest  to  the 
lowest  of  human  standards,  from  dense  ignorance  and 
brutal  instincts  to  culture,  refinement  and  all  that 
exalts  civilized  life.  It  was  our  good  fortune  to  be 
located  across  the  way  from  Westminster  Abbey,  the 
spot  around  which  clusters  more  interesting  bio- 
graphy, more  historical  reminiscence  and  more  senti- 
ment concerning  humanity  in  general  than  can  be 
found  in  any  other  spot  on  the  globe  of  similar 
dimensions. 

Westminster  Abbey  has  for  centuries  been  the 
resting  place  of  nobility,  kings,  queens,  lords  and 
dukes,  generals,  men  of  letters,  including  all  the  poet- 
laureates,  and  the  great  preachers  of  England.  In  the 
long  list  of  noted  men  I  recall,  was  Watts,  the  famous 
divine,  John  Wesley,  the  founder  of  Methodism,  Lord 
Palmerston,  Lord  Mansfield,  Warren  Hastings, 
Richard  Cobden,  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  Charles  Darwin, 
Lord  Macaulay,  W.  M.  Thackeray,  Joseph  Addison, 
Oliver  Goldsmith,  John  Milton,  Thomas  Campbell, 
Charles  Dickens,  Bulwer  Lytton,  Livingston,  Stanley, 


AGRICULTURAL  PHASES  IN  ENGLAND.  39 

Sir  Robert  Walpole,  Jenny  Lind,  Chatham,  Dryden, 
Ben  Jonson,  Cowper,  Disraeli,  Gladstone,  the  two  last 
being  among  the  most  famous  of  the  queen's  premiers. 
America   is    honored    by   the    busts    of   Longfellow, 
Lowell,  Whittier  and  others.     This  list  could  be  ex- 
tended to  almost  any  length.     To  find  room  for  the 
hundreds  of  honored  dead  has  taxed  the  capacity  of 
the  Abbey,  large  and  extensive  as  it  is.     The  marble 
floors  have  been  removed  to  find  room,  or  to  make 
place  for  the  nation's  illustrious  sons  and  daughters. 
Since  the  construction  of  the  Abbey  in  the  thirteenth 
century,  it  has  ever  been  regarded  a  mark  of  honor 
and  special  privilege  to  find  a  resting  place  within  its 
walls.    The  beauty  of  the  Abbey  long  sincex  vanished. 
Its  architecture  was  never  pleasing,  and  I  doubt  if  the 
old  structure  was  ever  accused  of  being  symmetrical 
or  comely.    Its  grimy  walls  are  in  streaks  assuming  an 
inky   blackness   and   the   rapid   deterioration   of  the 
marble  is  causing  much  solicitude.     There  is  an  awe- 
inspired   gloom  pervading  the  vast  recesses  of  this 
great  sepulchre  that  is  anything  but  cheerful,  but  its 
solemnity  tends  to  inspire  reverence.     Services  are 
being  carried  on  most  of  the  time  in  some  part  of  the 
Abbey,  and  to  give  an  adequate  account  of  the  inter- 
ests centered  there  would  require  much  more  space 
than  I  can  afford. 

London  Tower  (in  charge  of  a  corpulent  squad  of 
Englishmen  dressed  in  scarlet  and  known  as  "beef 
eaters")  consists  of  an  irregular  promiscuous  class  of 
buildings,  covering  thirteen  acres,  and  attracts  more 
attention  than  anything  else  in  London.  It  is  sur- 
rounded by  a  battlemented  wall  and  wide  deep  ditch, 


40  GLIMPSES   OF  EUROPE. 

which,  previous  to  a  half  century  ago,  was  kept  filled 
with  water  from  the  Thames  not  far  away. 

The  tower  or  series  of  towers,  consisting  of  at  least 
a  dozen  distinct  structures,  has  four  entrances,  namely, 
the  Iron  gate,  the  Water  gate,  the  Traitor's  gate  and 
Lion's  gate. 

The  construction  of  this  mighty  fortress  was  begun 
in  the  tenth  century,  and,  during  the  feudal  days 
through  which  England  passed,  was  used  for  a  prison. 
It  now  answers  the  purpose  of  an  armory  and  store- 
house where  great  quantities  of  government  property 
is  kept.  In  one  room  through  which  we  were  shown 
were  the  crown  jewels  enclosed  in  a  large  glass  case. 
Our  guide  informed  us  that  they  represented  the 
enormous  value  of  $17,000,000,  $5,000,000  of  which 
were  owned  by  Queen  Victoria.  There  are  coats-of- 
arms,  busts  and  statues  of  leading  statesmen,  of  gen- 
erals on  horseback,  of  dukes  and  lords,  too  numerous 
for  enumeration.  The  walls  of  the  towers  range  from 
eight  to  eleven  feet  thick,  the  windows  are  small  and 
heavily  grated,  the  stairways  and  the  halls  are  narrow, 
dusky  and  glum.  Nearly  every  room  has  a  sickening 
history,  written  in  blood.  It  was  here  that  in  the 
middle  ages  were  confined  kings,  queens,  dukes  and 
lords,  many  of  them  under  indictment  for  treason,  who 
paid  the  penalty  with  their  lives.  A  charge  of  treason 
was  usually  followed  by  the  suspected  persons  being 
beheaded;  in  many  cases  most  inhuman  torture  was 
resorted  to  to  extort  confession,  even  skinning  alive, 
the  most  cruel  resort  of  the  barbarian,  became  a  part 
of  the  black  record. 

In  the  bloody  tower  the  two  sons  of  Edward  IV 


AGRICULTURAL  PHASES  IN  ENGLAND.  41 

were  murdered  by  order  of  Richard  III.  We  were 
shown  the  room  where  Lady  Jane  Gray,  the  beautiful 
queen,  was  imprisoned  previous  to  her  execution.  We 
listened  to  the  blood  curdling  story  of  the  execution 
of  her  husband  early  in  the  morning;  the  account  of 
the  executioner  parading  in  front  of  her  window  with 
the  head  of  her  husband  erected  on  a  stick,  and  later 
in  the  day  of  her  being  led  out  to  the  block  and  decap- 
itated. The  ax  and  the  block  are  still  on  exhibition, 
where  the  lives  of  thousands  of  so-called  traitors  went 
out.  The  fifteenth  century  witnessed  the  climax  of 
treachery,  malice  and  hate,  of  soulless  cruelty  and 
inhuman  practices.  During  that  century  there  were 
beheaded  Thomas  Moore,  Queen  Anne  Boleyn, 
Thomas  Cromwell,  Queen  Catherine  Howard,  Lord 
Admiral  Seymour,  Lord  Guilford  Dudley,  Sir  John 
Elliot,  and  hosts  of  others,  conspicuous  in  the  annals 
of  history. 

Queen  Elizabeth  was  confined  as  a  prisoner  in  one 
of  the  rooms,  and  for  exercise  she  was  allowed  to  walk 
on  the  top  of  the  walls,  the  spot  being  pointed  out  to 
our  party.  The  room  where  Guy  Fawkes,  the  chief 
conspirator  of  the  plot  to  blow  up  the  Houses  of 
Parliament,  was  confined,  revived  the  recollection  of 
that  sensational  event  which  shocked  the  civilized 
world.  Fawkes  paid  a  dear  penalty  for  the  crime.  To 
make  his  death  as  impressive  as  possible,  he  was  re- 
quired to  write  his  name  before  being  tortured  and 
again  after  the  sufferings  of  torture.  These  two  signa- 
tures were  exhibited  throughout  Europe,  and  made  a 
part  of  European  history.  The  effect  of  becoming 
associated  with  the  frightful  horrors  enacted  a  few 


42  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

centuries  ago  is  not  pleasant,  but  no  man  can  listen  to 
these  tales  of  blood  without  being  impressed  with  the 
fact  that  the  world  is  growing  better,  that  human  life 
has  in  the  last  five  hundred  years  become  much  more 
sacred,  that  human  rights  are  better  guarded,  that 
humanity  has  broadened,  deepened  and  become  more 
intense.  It  was  difficult  for  me  to  realize,  while  sur- 
rounded with  these  evidences  of  cruelty  and  arbitrary 
power,  that  the  scenes  referred  to  were  enacted  by  the 
same  government  which  is  credited  with  doing  more 
for  the  spread  of  the  gospel,  for  enlightening  the 
ignorant,  for  eliminating  superstition  and  for  raising 
the  standards  of  humanity  and  Christianity  than  any 
other  civilized  government;  truly  the  world  is  making 
progress,  and  London  tower  so  long  used  for  a  prison, 
now  a  storehouse,  evidences  the  fact. 


THE  VASTNESS  OF  LONDON 


POOR  PEOPLE'S  MARKET— LONDON  BANK  AND  CRYSTAL  PALACE 
—ST.  PAUL'S  CATHEDRAL— HOUSE  OF  PARLIAMENT. 


St.  Paul's  Cathedral,  the  resting  place  of  Generals 
Nelson  and  Wellington,  is  exceeded  in  size  only  by 
St.  Peter's,  of  Rome,  and  the  eighth  wonder  of  the 
world  at  Milan.  It  rises  364  feet  out  of  the  most 
populous  and  one  of  the  most  central  business  por- 
tions of  London.  St.  Paul's  is  500  feet  long,  more 
than  100  feet  wide  and  a  marvel  of  magnificence  and 
beauty.  This  greatest  temple  to  Protestantism  was 
erected  200  years  ago,  and  the  established  church  of 
England  may  well  take  pride  in  its  elegance.  We 
attended  service  there  on  Sabbath  morning,  and  for 
two  hours  listened  to  the  music  from  its  great  organ, 
the  chants,  responsive  readings,  and  the  choruses  of 
200  voices  composing  the  choir.  At  12  o'clock  (the 
hour  when  all  Americans  attending  divine  service 
think  that  there  is  no  place  like  home)  the  sermon  at 
St.  Paul's  commenced.  In  the  congregation  there 
was  a  commendable  absence  of  everything  hinting  of 
caste.  The  rich  and  the  poor  worshipped  side  by  side, 
each  and  all  occupying  seats  which  were  lacking  in 
display  or  comfort. 

The  crystal  palace  at  Sydenham,  one  of  the 
suburbs  of  London,  is  worthy  of  at  least  half  a  day  of 
every  visitor's  time.  Erected  in  1851  and  composed 
entirely  of  glass  and  iron,  it  attracted  the  attention  of 
the  entire  civilized  world.  It  was  built  for  exposition 

48 


44  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

purposes.  Within  the  walls  may  be  found  a  generous 
supply  of  the  products  of  nature  and  art.  Portions  of 
the  building  are  divided  into  courts.  There  is  the 
Grecian,  Roman,  Italian,  Moorish,  Oriental  and 
others,  each  filled  with  the  handiwork  of  their  respec- 
tive countries.  Its  length  is  more  than  1,600  feet, 
width  an  average  of  200  feet,  and  height  ranging  from 
110  to  282  feet.  The  grounds  attached  comprise 
about  200  acres,  embracing  beautiful  landscapes, 
fountains,  flower  gardens,  shrubbery,  cascades  and 
everything  attractive  that  money  could  pay  for. 

Inside  is  an  opera  house,  theatre,  concert  halls,  a 
great  gallery,  with  an  immense  collection  of  statuary, 
choice  paintings  and  busts  of  eminent  men  of  all 
nations.  There  are  stalls  filled  with  all  sorts  of  knick-- 
knacks, toys  on  sale,  and  the  list  of  the  world's  curi- 
osities, prehistoric  and  otherwise,  is  inconceivably 
large.  As  a  place  for  recreation  Londoners  are  liberal 
patrons. 

The  London  bank,  covering  four  acres  of  land,  is 
an  enduring  monument  to  what  has  long  been  the 
financial  center  of  the  world.  Its  external  walls  are 
entirely  destitute  of  windows,  absolute  security  being 
the  excuse.  It  is  lighted  from  the  inner  courts.  The 
bank  was  founded  nearly  two  hundred  years  ago,  and 
is  the  only  bank  in  London  having  the  authority  to 
issue  paper  money.  There  is  usually  stored  in  its 
vaults  not  less  than  $100,000,000  in  gold.  The  paper 
issued  never  leaves  the  bank  but  once.  It  is  cancelled 
on  receipt,  and  in  due  time  destroyed.  This  bank  acts 
as  the  agent  of  the  government  in  all  transactions 
connected  with  the  national  debt,  now  amounting  to 


THE  VASTNESS  OF  LONDON.  45 

650,000,000  pounds  sterling.  The  government  of  the 
bank  is  vested  in  a  governor,  a  deputy  governor,  and 
twenty-four  directors.  More  than  1,000  persons  find 
employment  within  its  walls.  Its  location  is  the  chief 
point  of  convergence  of  the  London  omnibus  traffic. 

An  interesting  half  day  was  spent  in  the  zoological 
garden  at  Regents  Park.  This  park  embraces  nearly 
500  acres  of  ground,  and  numbers  an  immense  variety 
of  wild  animals,  birds,  fish,  etc.,  collected  from  all 
parts  of  the  globe.  An  African  giraffe  amused  us  by 
eating  leaves  from  a  tree  16  feet  from  the  ground. 
There  were  hippopotamus  with  mouths  that  you  never 
could  forget,  rhinoceroses  with  hides  and  horns  mak- 
ing them  a  terror,  lions  and  tigers  exhibiting  all  the 
ferocity  shown  in  their  native  forests  in  Africa.  There 
were  monkeys  and  monkeys.  Even  the  connecting 
link  was  pointed  out.  Serpents,  from  the  tiny  harm- 
less garter  snake  to  the  great  yellow  and  black  python 
twenty-eight  feet  in  length  and  two  feet  in  circumfer- 
ence. On  the  whole  an  exhibition  not  calculated  to 
produce  peaceful,  silent  slumber.  The  Strand,  Picca- 
dilly and  Charing  Cross,  the  museums,  the  parks  and 
the  numerous  monuments  can  only  receive  a  passing 
notice.  Volumes  could  be  written  describing  the 
sights  in  and  around  these  centers  of  population.  Old 
Bailey,  the  ancient  prison  of  London,  still  stands,  with 
its  memorable  record  and  historical  reminiscence. 

London  bridge,  although  rivaled  with  many  other 
bridges  across  the  Thames,  retains  its  proud  prestige, 
being  the  leading  highway.  By  actual  count  22,000 
teams  and  110,000  people  compose  the  number  cross- 
ing this  old  structure  during  twenty-four  hours.  A 


46  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

visit  to  the  poor  people's  market,  or  a  market  supply- 
ing many  of  the  poor  of  London,  was  not  without  its 
lessons.  Here  was  an  exhibition  of  what  poverty 
does.  Men,  women  and  children  clothed  in  tatters, 
dirty  and  half  nourished,  with  their  scanty  purses  were 
in  attendance.  Two  or  three  hundred  cast  off,  half 
worn  or  well  worn  garments  piled  on  the  sidewalk  in 
a  heap,  and  a  little  further  on  perhaps  five  bushels  of 
old  boots  and  shoes  in  another  pile  were  being  rum- 
maged through  for  fits  for  the  body  and  fits  for  the 
meager  purses. 

The  meat  stalls  seemed  to  be  stocked  with  the 
refuse  from  better  markets,  and  with  varieties  which 
could  be  purchased  cheap.  The  dialect  of  this  poverty- 
stricken,  uneducated  people  was  to  me  amazing.  I 
was  unable  to  understand  but  little  of  the  gibberish 
used  by  the  salesmen  crying  off  their  wares,  and  the 
gossip  of  the  old  ladies,  who  made  the  market  do  a 
dual  purpose,  to  me  was  unintelligible. 

These  poor  districts  offer  a  phase  of  life  in  the 
market  places  on  Saturday  evening  that  no  tourist  can 
afford  to  miss.  From  8  p.  m.  until  midnight,  a  swarm 
of  humanity  of  all  ages  congregate.  It  is  a  sort  of 
half  holiday  for  laboring  people,  and  mixed  with  their 
purchases  of  family  supplies  are  generous  quantities 
of  drink,  adding  to  the  hilarity  of  the  occasion.  Men, 
women  and  children,  especially  children,  contribute 
to  the  babel  of  voices,  and  the  vegetables,  fish,  fruits 
and  crockery,  cheap  clothing,  boots,  shoes,  etc.,  are 
bartered  for  in  loud  accents  and  rank  confusion. 

Into  the  great  stomach  of  London  has  passed 
and  remains  undigested  many  a  hamlet  that  today 


THE  VASTNESS  OF  LONDON.  47 

retains  a  semblance  of  its  original  identity,  or  has 
failed  to  accept  the  London  idea  of  modern  architec- 
ture. The  ancient  style  of  village  residences,  of 
country  business  places,  and  the  little  church  around 
the  corner  are  still  occupied  by  the  plain  people  in  the 
very  heart  of  the  great  metropolis. 

The  discipline  of  the  police  force  of  London  is 
excellent.  They  have  complete  control  of  the  crush 
of  teams  on  the  leading  thoroughfares  at  all  times, 
and  crossing  the  street  at  midday  in  charge  of  or 
under  the  eye  of  a  policeman  is  easily  done,  although 
it  looks  a  hazardous  business.  A  half  dozen  iron  posts 
two  feet  high,  set  in  a  group  three  feet  apart  in  the 
middle  of  the  principal  crossings,  offer  refuge  to  the 
swarms  of  pedestrians  fleeing  from  the  caravan  of 
carriages  and  busses.  It  would  require  consummate 
skill  to  throw  a  stone  near  the  heart  of  the  great 
metropolis  and  avoid  hitting  a  monument.  Kings, 
queens  and  heroes  have  for  centuries  been  finding 
conspicuous  positions  on  the  leading  thoroughfares 
of  London,  that  is,  there  have  been  erected  to  the 
memory  of  the  illustrious  dead  monuments  which 
will  long  endure.  Queen  Victoria  erected  to  her 
beloved  husband.  Prince  Albert,  a  structure  costing 
$600,000  and  the  finest  in  Great  Britain. 

Buckingham  Palace,  an  immense  gathering  of 
brick  and  marble,  and  long  the  home  of  Queen  Vic- 
toria, has  never  dazed  Americans  with  its  beauty  nor 
impressed  the  average  architect  with  its  comeliness. 
It  would  be  a  poor  rival  for  any  one  of  a  hundred 
residences  which  might  be  selected  in  New  York. 
Were  it  protected  by  some  ornamental  trees  and 


48  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

relieved  by  a  grass  plat,  it  would  seem  much  more 
homelike.  Maryborough  House,  not  far  away,  and 
the  London  residence  of  King  Edward,  retains  its 
original  identity.  London  abounds  in  fine  hotels. 
Their  management  differs,  however,  from  American 
hostelries. 

The  head  porter  of  a  London  hotel  is  a  sort  of 
field  marshal,  giving  direction  to  the  servants,  both 
in  and  out  of  the  house,  giving  the  guests  a  shake  of 
the  hand  when  they  arrive,  a  shake  when  they  leave, 
and  at  all  times  shaking  as  many  tips  out  of  their 
clothes  as  possible.  The  cost  of  living  at  the  best 
houses  reach  high  figures.  In  fact  the  style  of  living 
in  London,  similar  to  our  own,  whether  first,  second 
or  third  rate,  is  more  expensive  than  in  the  cities  of 
America.  A  table  de  hote  dinner  costing  a  dollar  in 
New  York  costs  one  dollar  and  a  half  in  London, 
while  a  lunch  which  would  cost  thirty  cents  in  Elyria 
and  twenty  cents  in  San  Francisco,  would  in  London 
cost  fifty  to  sixty  cents.  A  suit  of  ready-made  cloth- 
ing cannot  be  bought  cheaper  in  Great  Britain  or  on 
the  continent  than  in  Elyria,  although  tailor  made 
garments  cost  much  less.  The  tariff  paid  on  goods  in 
America,  and  extra  cost  of  cutting  and  making, 
representing  the  difference.  Stores  filled  with  Amer- 
ican clothing,  and  American  boots  and  shoes  exclu- 
sively, were  among  the  familiar  sights  in  the  busy 
marts  of  London.  The  Parliament  houses,  bathed  in  an 
atmosphere  of  royalty  and  statesmanship,  had  suffered 
a  temporary  surrender  to  myriads  of  doves,  they  call 
them  pigeons.  The  roofs,  the  cornice,  in  fact  every 
nook  and  corner  of  these  immense  piles  of  marble 


THE  VASTNESS  OF  LONDON.  49 

were  in  possession  of  the  birds.  Unfortunately  Par- 
liament was  not  in  session,,  and  the  dignified  land- 
marks who  stood  on  guard  swelled  with  their  impor- 
tance, seemed  to  revel  in  our  disappointment. 

To  comprehend  London  requires  an  enlarged 
vision.  From  the  London  bank,  centrally  located, 
there  is  fifteen  miles  of  solid  city  to  the  India  docks. 
The  population  of  the  great  metropolis  is  nearly  fifty 
per  cent  more  than  the  whole  state  of  Ohio.  London 
has  survived  fire  and  pestilence,  and  is  said  to  be 
growing  faster  than  ever.  The  city  has  a  multitude 
of  well-disposed  vagrants,  thousands  of  social  rem- 
nants of  society  ignorant  of  where  the  next  meal  is 
coming  from,  while  the  relics  of  misspent  lives  of  the 
Micawber  sort  assist  in  making  up  the  miscellaneous 
contingent. 


FIRST  IMPRESSIONS  OF  THE  CONTINENT 


BRUSSELS    THE    BEAUTIFUL,     CITY— WATERLOO— SERFDOM    AND 
LOW    WAGES    OF    THE    BELGIANS. 


From  London  to  Dover,  a  distance  of  seventy- 
eight  miles,  was  through  a  densely  populated  coun- 
try. We  were  rarely  out  of  sight  of  either  a  city, 
village  or  hamlet. 

The  physical  aspects  of  the  country  differ  but  little 
from  the  central  portions  of  England,  but,  in  addition 
to  agricultural  pursuits,  manufacturing  employs  a  ma- 
jority of  the  people.  Chatham,  the  largest  town  on 
the  route,  old  and  finished,  has  an  air  of  comfort,  and 
its  numerous  church  spires  were  in  harmony  with 
other  cities  throughout  the  kingdom.  The  English 
at  home  are  a  church-going  people,  not  only  are  their 
churches  well  attended,  but  the  audiences  of  their 
street  preachers  holding  forth  on  the  leading  thor- 
oughfares of  London  were  large.  Evangelists  and 
reformers  are  having  a  desperate  struggle  with  de- 
pravity and  immorality  existing  in  the  slums  of  the 
great  cities.  While  the  combat  in  some  localities 
seems  to  be  an  unequal  one,  the  sincerity  and  devo- 
tion of  these  advocates  of  Christianity  and  temper- 
ance are  making  a  deep  impression. 

Loyalty  to  the  rulers  and  to  the  government 
throughout  the  kingdom  is  a  leading  characteristic 
of  the  people  of  England.  The  good  order  existing 
and  the  prompt  punishment  of  criminals  reflect  this 

50 


FIRST  IMPRESSIONS  OF  THE  CONTINENT.       51 

loyalty  and  assist  in  making  what  is  known  as  a 
"strong  government." 

As  we  approached  Dover  the  immense  chalk-beds, 
white  as  the  driven  snow,  furnished  a  unique  attrac- 
tion. 

With  a  babel  of  foreign  tongues  as  we  approached 
the  English  channel  our  party  of  tourists  began  to 
have  troubles  of  their  own.  Peculiar  English  dialects 
were  exchanged  for  German  and  French  languages. 
To  understand  and  to  be  understood  required 
patience,  perseverance  and  long-suffering. 

There  is  little  to  be  said  of  Dover  except  its  sub- 
stantial appearance  as  the  most  conspicuous  port  on 
the  English  channel.  Our  trip  from  Dover  to  Os- 
tend,  a  distance  of  70  miles,  was  covered  in  three- 
and-a-half  hours.  We  had  sunshine,  gentle  breezes 
and  smooth  seas.  Ostend,  the  leading  port  of  Bel- 
gium, is  not  only  a  health  resort  but  a  beautiful  city 
with  magnificent  hotels.  It  is  paved  and  its  streets 
are  kept  scrupulously  clean.  King  Leopold  spends 
a  good  share  of  his  summers  there,  taking  in  the  sea 
breezes. 

Visiting  their  public  market  at  five  p.  m.  we 
found  both  country  and  city  people  anxiously  waiting 
for  customers  for  their  vegetables,  fruit,  butter, 
cheese,  eggs,  etc.  The  stalls  were  usually  in  charge 
of  women,  and  where  buyers  were  lacking  these  mar- 
ket women  were  filling  up  the  time  by  sewing  or 
knitting. 

Our  ride  to  Brussels  was  robbed  of  all  interest  by 
being  taken  in  the  night.  Upon  arrival  our  party  was 
packed  into  vehicles  strongly  resembling  open  street 


B2  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

cars,  which  instead  of  being  propelled  upon  steel  rails 
went  rattling  "over  the  stony  streets."  There  was  no 
sound  of  revelry  in  this,,  Belgium's  capital.  One  pair 
of  horses,  with  huge  bodies  and  legs  to  correspond, 
finally  landed  us  at  the  Hotel  Empereaur,  an  exten- 
sive hostelry  giving  a  fair  service. 

Brussels  has  a  population  of  about  300,000  in- 
habitants, is  a  beautiful  city,  said  to  be  an  imitation 
of  Paris  as  near  as  possible.  It  abounds  in  white 
buildings  of  modern  architecture,  but  unlike  Paris  all 
its  streets  are  wholesomely  clean  and  its  public  build- 
ings and  business  places  all  have  a  neat,  tidy  appear- 
ance. Brussels  is  the  metropolis  of  the  carpet  and 
lace  industries.  Its  carpets  and  fine  laces  leading  in 
all  the  markets  of  the  world. 

Its  palace  of  justice  costing  $10,000,000,  located 
on  a  high  elevation,  is  said  to  be  the  largest  building 
of  its  kind  in  existence.  There  is  no  lack  of  extrava- 
gance in  its  construction,  and  while  not  strikingly  at- 
tractive in  architecture,  its  finish  is  superb.  The 
streets  and  boulevards  of  the  city  are  broad,  well 
paved  and  well  kept.  Its  long  boulevard  extending 
to  a  magnificent  park  has  six  rows  of  forest  trees 
(mostly  sycamore)  neatly  trimmed.  Between  these 
rows  of  trees  there  are  two  broad  walks,  a  wide  track 
for  horseback  riders  and  two  broad  streets  for  vehi- 
cles. It  is  doubtful  whether  a  finer  boulevard  can  be 
found  in  either  Europe  or  America.  Its  park  system 
is  very  extensive,  embracing  thousands  of  acres  of 
undulating  forest,  partially  improved.  Within  the 
confines  of  the  forest  elegant  buildings  have  been 
erected  where  sportsmen  and  seekers  of  pleasure 


FIRST  IMPRESSIONS  OF  THE  CONTINENT.       53 

along  various  lines  are  entertained.  There  are  con- 
cert halls,  restaurants,  etc.  A  leading  characteristic 
of  the  Belgians  is  their  tendency  to  pleasure-seeking. 
Our  visit  included  memorial  day  for  King  Leopold, 
and  all  the  better  classes  seemed  to  be  out  for  a  good 
time.  There  was  music,  fireworks,  and  hilarity  every- 
where, which  the  ruddy-faced  king  seemed  to  enjoy. 
The  drinking  of  beer  and  light  wines  in  Brussels  is 
beyond  American  conception.  The  saloons,  restau- 
rants and  hotels  from  four  p.  m.  until  midnight  are  not 
only  crowded,  but  the  broad  walks  in  front  of  the 
drinking  places  were  literally  covered  with  tables  and 
chairs  filled  with  the  best  classes  of  people  coming  by 
families  to  indulge  in  the  native  drinks.  On  Sunday 
the  business  places  were  all  open  and  apparently  well 
patronized.  The  church  that  our  party  visited  was 
but  slimly  attended.  For  the  first  time  in  my  experi- 
ence the  usher  handed  back  one-half  of  my  small  con- 
tribution. 

Brussels  boasts  of  one  of  the  finest  art  galleries  in 
the  world.  Some  of  Rubens'  best  efforts  are  upon 
its  walls.  Its  Bourse,  one  of  the  leading  financial  in- 
stitutions of  the  world,  is  a  stately  affair,  and  unlike 
her  houses  of  Parliament,  is  handsome,  being  con- 
structed of  granite  and  highly  ornamented  with  rich 
carving.  It  has  a  tower  370  feet  in  height. 

In  one  of  the  small  squares  of  the  city  was  pointed 
out  the  spot  where  2,000  soldiers  were  buried,  who 
were  killed  in  the  revolution  of  1830. 

Waterloo,  twelve  miles  away,  is  preserved  as  a 
revenue  getter.  Some  of  the  land  marks,  which  re- 
call the  memorable  battle  of  June  18,  1815,  are  to  be 


64  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

seen.  Whether  the  accommodating  guide  possessed 
a  high  order  of  integrity  is  another  question,  at  any 
rate  he  made  a  pretense  of  all  the  knowledge  needed 
and  told  a  plausible  story. 

Few  Americans  visit  Brussels  without  making  the 
trip  to  Waterloo  and  having  the  satisfaction  of  seeing 
the  spot  where  the  army  of  the  great  Napoleon  was 
crushed  by  Wellington  and  where  the  fate  of  nations 
was  at  least  temporarily  settled  by  the  sword. 

Belgium,  one  of  the  smallest  kingdoms  of  Europe, 
of  which  Brussels  is  the  capital,  at  the  last  federal 
census  had  about  485  people  to  the  square  mile.  It 
is  the  most  densely  populated  country  in  Europe. 
Brussels  seems  to  have  gathered  in  her  full  share  of 
the  Belgians,  its  streets  during  the  day  are  congested 
and  the  evidences  of  overpopulation  are  numerous; 
wages  are  down  to  starvation  prices,  a  good  man  put- 
ting in  full  time — for  work  on  the  streets — receives 
from  40  to  50  cents  per  day.  A  first-class  servant  girl 
50  cents  per  week  or  $2.00  a  month.  The  woman 
who  from  morning  until  night  was  down  on  her  knees 
scrubbing  the  floors  of  our  hotel,  and  the  sidewalk  in 
front  of  the  house,  received  therefor  an  equivalent  of 
ten  cents  of  our  money,  the  same  wages  being  paid 
to  the  muscular  young  woman  with  short  dress, 
wooden  shoes,  and  a  bare  head,  bearing  a  neck-yoke 
on  her  shoulders  to  which  was  attached  two  large 
cans  of  milk,  which  she  peddled  from  door  to  door, 
and  also  to  the  woman  in  charge  of  a  dog-cart,  her 
duty  being  to  give  the  faithful  dog  direction  where  to 
go  with  his  unwieldy  load  and  to  assist  him  up  the 
inclines  and  over  the  rough  places.  To  the  shame  of 


FIRST  IMPRESSIONS  OF  THE  CONTINENT.       55 

the  beautiful  city  I  have  described  the  peasantry  is 
subjected  to  burdens  which  should  be  borne  by  the 
beasts,  and  their  small  compensation  is  a  disgrace  to 
civilization. 

Brussels  is  abreast  with  the  leading  countries  of 
Europe  in  respect  to  the  arts  and  sciences.  It  has 
traditions  in  which  it  takes  pride,  but  it  seems  to  be 
woefully  lacking  in  respect  and  sympathy  for  the 
poorer  classes.  A  civilized  country  that  in  this  en- 
lightened age  places  its  burdens  upon  the  women  and 
the  dogs  needs  to  be  regenerated.  I  was  informed 
that  women  in  Belgium  have  no  rights  which  the 
lords  of  creation  are  bound  to  respect.  The  girls, 
which  by  hundreds  are  employed  in  the  lace  factories, 
receive  from  20  to  30  cents  a  day  for  their  skilled 
labor. 

In  their  bright  faces  there  were  traces  of  despond- 
ency. They  seemed  to  be  living  without  hope,  while 
the  product  of  their  brains  and  their  fingers  adorns 
the  wealthy  classes  wherever  civilization  has  obtained 
a  foothold.  Common  laborers  are  mere  serfs  eking 
out  a  scanty  subsistence.  There  was  wildness  notice- 
able in  the  eyes  of  many,  suggestive  of  anarchy.  I 
left  Brussels  with  a  feeling  that  it  was  a  many-sided 
city.  Much  to  commend  and  much  to  criticise.  Op- 
portunities for  young  men  to  rise  in  the  world  seemed 
to  be  limited  to  a  few  of  the  favored  classes.  The 
kitchens,  workshops  and  farms  of  America  could' 
give  profitable  employment  to  thousands  of  her 
ruddy-faced  young  men  and  women,  who  at  home 
subsist  along  the  ragged  edges  of  charity.  If  some 
enterprising  Yankee  would  import  a  few  thousand  of 


66  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

these  women  and  girls  to  be  employed  in  American 
families  he  would  earn  the  gratitude  of  both  coun- 
tries. 

Our  three  days  stay  in  Brussels  ended  July  23rd, 
and  our  long  ride  to  Cologne  was  as  tedious  as  can 
be  imagined. 

The  methods  for  shipping  cattle  in  America  are 
better  regulated,  more  systematic  and  more  satisfac- 
tory to  the  shipper  than  the  practices  adhered  to  on 
the  continent  for  handling  tourists  as  regards  time. 

It  was  our  misfortune  after  crossing  the  English 
channel  to  be  confined  to  transportation  over  rail- 
roads owned  by  the  respective  governments.  The 
trains  are  all  in  charge  of  soldiers,  and  these  brilliant 
vagabonds,  puffed  up  by  their  regimentals,  are  uncivil, 
ungentlemanly  and  arbitrary.  Government  owner- 
ship destroys  competition  and  gives  a  fatal  stab  to 
progress.  Our  conductor  at  Brussels  made  a  strenu- 
ous request  that  we  be  landed  at  Cologne  by  a  cer- 
tain hour.  The  manager  replied,  "We  have  but  three 
American  locomotives,  if  I  can  secure  one  of  them 
we  can  make  the  time,  if  not  it  will  be  impossible." 
We  failed  to  get  the  American  machine,  and  the  dead 
and  alive  train  under  the  heat  of  a  burning  sun  pro- 
ceeded at  gravel-train  speed  occupying  a  full  day, 
long-to-be-remembered. 

The  country  between  these  two  cities  is  a  marvel 
of  productiveness  to  most  Americans,  its  high  order 
of  agriculture,  its  crops  of  wheat,  oats,  barley,  rye 
and  all  root  crops  were  amazing;  eighty  bushels  of 
wheat  per  acre,  a  crop  never  to  be  thought  of  in 
America,  is  said  upon  good  authority  to  be  common 


FIRST  IMPRESSIONS  OF  THE  CONTINENT.       57 

in  Germany  and  Belgium.  Such  maximums  are  only 
attained  by  the  highest  grade  of  fertility,  the  most 
diligent  processes  of  cultivation,  and  the  use  of  the 
most  productive  varieties  of  grain.  A  friend  informed 
me  that  he  had  seen  women  and  children  in  the  wheat 
fields  during  the  month  of  May  stirring  the  ground 
between  the  rows  of  wheat  with  narrow  hoes  to  pro- 
mote the  growth  of  the  plant. 

The  best  crops  of  grain  to  be  seen  along  this  route 
were  lodged  and  twisted  into  all  sorts  of  tangles  which 
to  an  American  farmer  would  suggest  ruin  to  his 
crop,  but  in  Germany,  for  some  unexplained  reason, 
interferes  but  little  with  the  yield  of  grain.  The  face 
of  this  old,  old  country  is  in  striking  contrast  with 
Britain.  The  farming  lands  are  divided  into  small 
squares  generally  ranging  from  J4  acre  to  two  acres 
in  size. 

There  are  no  fences  dividing  the  fields,  but  the 
\ariety  of  crops  under  cultivation  make  an  attractive 
landscape,  reminding  you  of  a  checker  board.  These 
little  patches  of  land  are  usually  owned  by  as  many 
people  as  there  are  pieces.  An  acre  is  supposed  to 
produce  enough  to  supply  a  family  of  ordinary  size 
with  bread  and  vegetables  for  a  year. 


THE  GERMANS  IN  THE  "VATERLAND" 


PERFUMED  WATER— CATHEDRAL-CHURCH  OF  URSULA— CHARMS 
OF  THE  RHINE— HEIDELBERG. 


The  German  peasantry  is  thoroughly  schooled  in 
the  precepts  and  practices  of  rural  and  social  econ- 
omy. The  bent  of  their  lives  is  in  the  direction  of 
the  largest  possible  production  of  the  necessities  of 
life,  and  the  most  economical  consumption  of  the 
same.  No  thought  of  luxury  or  extravagance  enters 
into  their  calculations.  Their  habitations  are  neither 
luxurious,  attractive,  nor  homelike.  Generally  rather 
long,  one-story  brick  houses,  located  in  groups,  mak- 
ing a  little  hamlet,  where  a  store  or  two  obviates  the 
necessity  of  a  tramp  to  a  large  town  for  supplies.  The 
brick  in  the  houses  are  of  motley  and  unsightly  varie- 
ties, being  a  mixture  of  red  and  black. 

Usually  the  live  stock  owned  by  the  proprietor  is 
housed  under  the  same  roof  with  his  family,  it  being 
the  duty  of  the  wife  and  children  to  care  for  the  same. 

One  of  our  party  (a  lady  teacher  from  Youngs- 
town)  managed,  by  paying  a  little  fee,  to  gain  admit- 
tance to  one  of  these  farm  houses,  where  she  took  an 
account  of  stock.  Here  is  her  report :  "Ground  floor 
in  six  apartments;  first  room  contained  agricultural 
implements ;  second,  six  cows ;  third,  six  calves  and 
one  horse;  fourth,  stair  case,  and  beyond  this  the 
kitchen;  fifth,  dining  room,  in  which  was  one  table 
without  cloth,  and  around  it  sat  six  men  and  two 

58 


THE  GERMANS  IN  THE  "VATERLAND."  59 

women;  in  center  of  table,  one  large  flask  of  wine, 
one  large  loaf  of  barley  bread  and  one  butcher  knife- 
each  individual  cut  his  own  bread  and  drank  from  the 
flask  at  his  pleasure — sixth,  bedroom;  two  beds,  husk 
mattresses  upon  them,  and  feather  ticks,  and  also 
feather  cover.  Floors  of  stone  in  brick  form,  or  of 
heavy  plank  and  very  clean.  Second  story  contained 
bedrooms,  and  hay  above  stalls." 

Cows  are  the  principal  beasts  of  burden  in  the 
farming  communities  of  Germany.  In  the  morning 
after  being  milked  she  is  hitched  to  the  cart,  the  plow, 
or  the  harrow,  and  generally  under  the  guiding  hand 
of  the  mistress  of  the  household  performs  an  honest 
day's  labor  submissively.  She  is  usually  well  fed,  well 
groomed  and  slick.  It  was  not  rare  to  see  her  calf 
follow  in  the  furrow  behind  the  plow. 

I  saw  more  women  than  men  at  work  in  the  fields 
in  Germany.  In  the  harvest  fields  the  women  handle 
the  sickle  and  scythes  with  as  much  skill  and  dexterity 
as  the  men.  Their  bare  heads,  brown  faces,  short 
dresses,  wooden  shoes,  evidence  their  industry  and 
familiarity  with  the  hard  side  of  life.  The  above  de- 
scription refers  only  to  the  German  peasantry  or  the 
poorer  classes.  There  is  another  class  of  farmers  who 
live  like  Nabobs.  They  have  fine  houses,  elegant  sur- 
roundings and  fare  sumptuously  every  day.  The 
German  empire  requires  for  its  standing  army  more 
than  1,000,000  men,  leaving  a  surplus  of  its  female 
population  at  home. 

The  rents  to  be  paid  for  their  land  ranges  from 
$7.00  to  $15.00  an  acre,  according  to  quality  and 
location.  This  is  a  potent  levy  upon  the  vitality  and 


60  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

endurance  of  the  German  peasantry.  These  people 
are  intelligent,  and  the  compulsory  system  of  educa- 
tion in  Germany  fits  large  numbers  for  a  better  sta- 
tion than  they  are  able  to  obtain  in  the  "Vaterland." 
Students  of  sociology  studying  the  habits  and  cus- 
toms of  the  Germans  readily  account  for  the  fact  that 
German  immigrants  to  America  become  a  leading 
factor  in  the  thrift  and  prosperity  of  this  country. 

It  is  said,  that  in  spite  of  her  scanty  resources 
and  unfortunate  environments  in  their  native  land, 
that  the  most  of  them  manage  to  accumulate  enough 
to  meet  the  demands  of  old  age.  This  thrift  was 
demonstrated  during  the  Franco-Prussian  war  when 
German  bonds  were  largely  taken  by  its  peasantry. 

As  is  well  known  Germany  is  one  of  the  leading 
manufacturing  countries  of  Europe.  Little  villages 
with  numberless  smoke  stacks  are  to  be  found  in  all 
parts  of  the  empire,  and  these  villages  furnish  a  home 
market  and  fair  prices  for  the  products  of  the  farm. 

America  of  late  years  has  so  often  trampled  upon 
German  toes  by  forcing  her  manufactured  products 
upon  the  German  markets  that  a  feeling  of  resent- 
ment against  American  competition  exists  through- 
out that  country.  Their  prejudice  against  Americans 
was  noticeable,  especially  among  the  higher  classes  of 
the  kingdom. 

Cologne,  a  city  of  300,000  inhabitants,  located  on 
the  Rhine,  is  the  capital  of  Rhineish  Prussia.  It  is  con- 
nected with  the  town  of  Dutz  on  the  opposite  bank 
of  the  Rhine  by  a  bridge  of  boats  and  an  elegant  iron 
bridge  1,362  feet  in  length.  The  streets  of  Cologne 
are  narrow,  crooked  and  well  paved.  Public  build- 


THE  GERMANS  IN  THE  "VATERLAND."  61 

ings  are  many,  including  charitable  and  educational 
institutions.  The  city  was  organized  in  the  third  cen- 
tury, and  during  its  early  history  it  was  the  scene  of 
carnage,  bloodshed,  barbarism  and  cruelty.  The 
church  of  St.  Ursula  gets  its  distinction  by  being  the 
place  where  are  preserved  the  bones  of  11,000  virgins, 
companions  of  St.  Ursula,  who  were  slaughtered  by 
the  "Huns"  because  they  refused  to  violate  their  vows 
of  chastity.  Thousands  of  these  bones  are  on  exhibi- 
tion, covering  the  walls  of  some  of  the  rooms  in  this 
ancient  sepulchre  or  church. 

The  principal  object  of  interest  in  Cologne,  as 
well  as  one  of  the  greatest  ornaments  of  Europe,  is 
its  Cathedral,  a  rare  specimen  of  Gothic  architecture. 
The  eighth  century  witnessed  the  partial  erection  of 
the  Cathedral  which  was  burned  in  1248.  More  than 
600  years  was  required  for  the  rebuilding  of  the  new 
Cathedral,  which  was  begun  immediately  after  the 
destruction  of  the  old  one.  The  final  completion  of 
the  towers  took  place  in  1880.  The  highest  pinnacle, 
512  feet  from  the  ground,  beats  all  records,  reaching 
farther  toward  heaven  than  any  other  church  spire  in 
the  world.  The  body  of  the  church  measures  500  feet 
in  length,  230  feet  in  breadth,  and  the  cost  of  the 
structure  is  estimated  at  $10,000,000.  The  Cathedral 
is  symmetrical,  well  balanced  and  elegant.  The  city 
is  overwhelmingly  Roman  Catholic. 

Cologne,  like  many  European  cities,  has  smells 
of  its  own.  Nearly  200  years  ago,  if  legendry  is 
to  be  credited,  one  John  Maria  Farina  invent- 
ed a  perfumed  water  to  counteract  the  bad 
odors  of  the  city.  His  cologne  acquired  a  commer- 


62  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

eial  importance  even  to  the  ends  of  the  earth,  and  al- 
though "John"  long  since  passed  to  the  great  beyond, 
his  invention  continues  to  fill  the  cash  boxes  of  at 
least  forty  of  the  manufacturers  and  wholesale  dealers 
in  the  genuine  article.  Near  the  banks  of  the  Rhine 
is  a  square  composed  of  several  acres  devoted  to  mar- 
ket purposes,  a  place  where  country  produce  is  of- 
fered for  sale.  There  were  many  things  comical  or 
unique  and  interesting  to  Americans  connected  with 
this  layout.  The  fruits  and  garden  truck,  spreading 
over  acres  of  ground,  were  usually  in  charge  of 
women,  portly  and  well  developed.  Hundreds  of  dog 
carts  heavily  loaded  arrived  upon  the  scene  from  the 
nearby  farhis  before  daylight  in  the  morning,  and  the 
dogs  by  their  continuous  barking  made  an  interesting- 
case  for  the  would-be  morning  sleepers  in  the  im- 
mediate neighborhood. 

Dog-muscle  in  Germany  is  appreciated  as  highly 
as  horse-muscle  in  America.  No  regard  seems  to  be 
had  for  blood,  as  brindle  dogs  and  yellow  dogs  are 
as  common  and  as  useful  as  any  other ;  they  are  suit- 
ably harnessed  and  hitched  to  their  load  immediately 
under  the  front  end  of  the  cart,  and  their  strength  or 
power  to  handle  a  large  load  is  an  amazement.  They 
are  not  only  beasts  of  burden  in  the  discharge  of  an 
important  duty,  but  are  watch  dogs  on  guard  ready 
at  all  times  to  protect  the  property  they  handle. 

Our  ride  of  115  miles  on  the  Rhine  from  Cologne 
to  Mayence  upon  a  well  ordered  steamer  of  light 
draught,  was  thoroughly  enjoyable.  The  bright  sun- 
shine, the  blue  sparkling  water,  the  scenery  along  the 
banks  contributed  to  a  charm  never  to  be  forgotten. 


THE  GERMANS  IN  THE  "VATERLAND."  63 

The  Rhine,  fed  by  the  eternal  snows  on  the  mountain- 
peaks  in  the  far  distance,  has  a  greater  volume  of 
water  in  mid-summer  than  at  any  other  season  of  the 
year,  as  it  is  then  the  blazing  sun  makes  its  deepest 
impresion  upon  the  glaciers  and  eternal  snows  of  the 
Alps.  Thousands  of  tributaries  combine  to  make  the 
magnificent  flow  of  the  Rhine  in  its  northward  course. 
The  banks  reaching  up  hundreds  of  feet  on  either  side 
made  a  ceaseless  and  ever-changing  panorama  to  be 
studied  and  admired.  Castles  in  ruins  and  otherwise, 
that!  during-  the  feudal  days  protected  the  robber 
barons,  were  constantly  in  sight;  from  these  strong- 
holds during  the  middle-ages  land  pirates  would 
swoop  down  upon  the  navigators  of  the  Rhine,  rob 
without  mercy  and  retreat  to  the  castles  with  their 
plunder,  where,  owing  to  the  absence  of  latter-day 
munitions  of  war,  their  walls  were  impregnable.  Cas- 
tles are  not  the  only  ancient  landmarks ;  villages  and 
small  cities  erected  entirely  of  stone  could  be  seen 
upon  the  highest  peaks  facing  the  Rhine  in  partial 
or  utter  ruin ;  many  of  them  seem  to  be  without  an 
inhabitant,  tumbling  down  and  going  to  decay ;  other 
cities,  many  of  them  extending  down  to  the  waters' 
edge,  of  more  recent  origin,  had  an  air  of  thrift  and 
importance.  Bonn,  the  birthplace  of  Beethoven,  the 
illustrious  musician ;  Bingen,  the  home  of  the  soldier- 
boy  of  whose  death  the  poet  Norton  gives  such  a 
touching  account,  are  cities  of  commercial  prosper- 
ity. But  the  principal  attraction  of  the  Rhine  is  in  its 
terraces  along  the  banks,  sometimes  numbering  as 
many  as  fifteen,  one  above  another.  It  is  here  that 
the  German  peasant  demonstrates  the  value  of  land 


64  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

for  fruit  and  agricultural  purposes.  To  get  a  foot- 
hold, first  the  shrubbery  and  forest,  often  of  large 
growth,  must  be  cleared  away  from  a  bank  too  steep 
to  admit  of  ready  ascent  or  descent.  Solid  rock  and 
boulders  intermixed  with  the  soil  must  be  reckoned 
with  in  the  construction  of  the  terraces.  When  com- 
pleted these  little  platforms  of  earth  must  be  fertilized, 
and  the  fertilizer  is  usually  borne  upon  the  backs  of 
the  laborers.  Grapes  for  wine  purposes  is  the  princi- 
pal crop  raised,  and  the  quantity  or  extent  of  these 
vineyards  is  bewildering.  A  hint  is  here  offered 
wrhich  accounts  for  the  low  price  of  German  wines. 

Up  hundreds  of  feet  above  the  water  an  occasional 
plateau  could  be  seen  devoted  to  agriculture;  little 
patches  of  wheat,  oats,  barley,  and  potatoes,  of  perhaps 
a  quarter  of  an  acre,  each  being  harvested  under  the 
most  adverse  conditions;  the  land  elevated  at  an  angle 
of  probably  40  degrees  made  hand  cultivation  neces- 
sary, and  the  crop  when  harvested  must  be  borne  on 
the  backs  of  the  peasants  down  long  winding  paths 
to  the  foot  of  the  hill  where  it  could  be  made  available. 

On  each  side  of  the  Rhine,  scarcely  above  high 
water  mark,  there  is  a  railroad  apparently  doing  a 
thriving  business.  Arriving  at  Mayence  in  the  even- 
ing we  found  but  little  worthy  of  note ;  there  was  the 
customary  brass  music,  a  distinctive  feature  of  all  Ger- 
man cities,  both  great  and  small ;  thousands  of  sol- 
diers are  disciplined  in  Mayence  at  the  extensive  bar- 
racks owned  by  the  government.  Gillmore's  printing 
press,  said  to  be  the  first  press  ever  used,  is  stored  at 
Mayence.  We  had  an  attractive  ride  to  Heidelberg 
through  fields  of  hops,  beets,  potatoes,  corn  and  ap- 


THE  GERMANS  IN  THE  "VATERLAND."  65 

pies,  interspersed  with  numerous  smoke  stacks  until 
the  black  forest  was  reached. 

The  gloomy  old  woods  fairly  frowned  upon  us.  It 
was  not  unlike  some  of  the  forests  of  America,  but 
government  laws,  unlike  our  own,  protect  their  for- 
ests by  providing  a  penalty  and  punishment  for  every 
person  who  cuts  a  tree  and  fails  to  replace  it  by  an- 
other. 

Heidelberg,  the  seat  of  much  learning,  is  scattered 
about  without  regard  to  form  or  regularity.  The 
most  of  this  intellectual  town  lies  at  the  foot  of  the 
Geisberg  mountains  and  along  the  left  bank  of  the 
river  Neckar.  On  a  single  street  centers  nearly  all 
there  is  worth  mentioning,  except  the  long  winding 
road  up  the  mountain  to  the  famous  Heidelberg  cas- 
tle. This  ancient  fortress  was  erected  on  the  summit 
of  a  high  perpendicular  wall  of  solid  rock.  Its  archi- 
tect and  builders,  who  projected  and  constructed  its 
twenty-foot  walls,  evidently  believed  in  its  resistance. 
If  traditions  are  to  be  believed  it  survived  many  a 
siege,  but  at  last  the  French  managed  to  get  some 
powder  under  it  and  blow  up  a  portion  of  its  heavy 
masonry.  In  the  cellar  under  this  castle  is  still  pre- 
served intact  the  famous  Heidelberg  Tun,  an  over- 
grown barrel,  36  feet  long,  24  feet  high,  having  a 
capacity  of  800  hogsheads;  this  Tun  was  an  out- 
growth of  a  freaky  brain,  which  undertook  to  provide 
against  a  famine  or  a  failure  in  the  grape  crop.  His- 
tory says  that  the  big  barrel  was  never  filled. 

How  the  poor  workmen  ever  managed  to  elevate 
to  such  a  height  material  enough  to  build  such  a 
castle  is  an  unsolved  mystery. 


66  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

The  university  of  Heidelberg  is  its  principal  reve- 
nue producer ;  here  are  gathered  young  men  in  great 
numbers,  generally  to  finish  their  education;  culti- 
vation of  the  muscles  as  well  as  of  the  mind  enters 
largely  into  this  education ;  these  students  are  fight- 
ers, duelling  is  a  not  unfrequent  practice,  stabbing, 
slashing  and  fist  cuffs  are  common  practices ;  scarred 
faces,  bloody  noses  and  black  eyes  are  too  common 
at  the  university  to  attract  special  notice.  Why  this 
is  tolerated  or  allowed  by  the  faculty  was  not  ex- 
plained. 


IRKSOME  RAILROADING  ON  THE 
CONTINENT 


LUCERNE  AND  ITS  ATTRACTIONS— THE  ALPS— THE  WONDERS  OF 
THE  ST.  GOTHARD  ROUTE— THE  LAND  OF  WILLIAM  TELL. 


An  irksome  ride  in  a  German  sweat-box  unworthy 
the  name  of  a  passenger  coach,  landed  us  in  Baden- 
Baden,  a  city  of  about  16,000  inhabitants,  entertain- 
ing nearly,  or  quite,  40,000  guests. 

The  city  consists  largely  of  palatial  hotels  and 
public  bath  houses,  with  the  et-ceteras  needed  to  sus- 
tain its  reputation  as  a  fashionable  watering  place. 
Baden-Baden  is  of  ancient  date  and  of  attractive  ap- 
pearance. Formerly  it  was  the  Monte  Carlo  of  Eu- 
rope, being  the  resort  of  the  sporting  fraternity,  more 
especially  the  gamblers  of  France,  Germany  and 
Switzerland,  but  a  law  passed  in  1872  put  a  quietus  on 
gambling,  as  it  is  being  strictly  enforced.  Public 
utility  since,  of  its  mineral  waters,  has  filled  up  the 
hotels  with  a  better  class  of  guests  than  formerly. 

The  low  price  of  the  baths  tends  to  the  promotion 
of  both  health  and  cleanliness,  and  the  authorities 
and  residents  of  the  city  seem  to  be  imbued  with  an 
anti-dirt  propensity.  Baden  is  scrupulously  clean, 
and  taken  all  in  all  is  one  of  the  most  fascinating  spots 
seen  in  our  travels  through  nine  countries  of  Europe. 

Of  course  Baden  has  a  castle.  It  took  a  long 
hour's  ride  up  a  winding  road  through  a  dense  forest 
to  find  it,  being  located  on  the  highest  peak  of  a 

67 


68  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

mountain  adjacent  to  the  city.  The  old  citadel  was 
of  more  than  ordinary  interest  as  citadels  ^o.  The 
dizzy  height  of  its  location,  the  perpendicular  walls 
of  rock  that  support  it,  the  query  of  whence  came  the 
material  for  its  construction,  of  who  built  it,  and  who 
wrecked  it,  to  us  were  questions  that  no  one  seemed 
prepared  to  answer.  From  the  pinnacle  we  got  a 
magnificent  view  of  the  city  and  surrounding  coun- 
try, its  hills,  its  valleys,  its  streams,  its  forests,  its 
farm  houses,  which  were  both  captivating  and  en- 
chanting. 

We  were  fortunate  in  being  present  at  two  of 
Sousa's  band  concerts.  His  patriotic  airs  given  under 
the  folds  of  the  stars  and  stripes  touched  the  hearts  of 
every  American  present.  Acres  of  the  elite  and  well- 
to-do  people  gathered  in  their  gorgeously  decorated 
gardens,  located  in  the  center  of  the  city,  to  listen  to 
Sousa's  exquisite  music,  and  to  pay  tribute  to  this 
illustrious  musician.  Both  Sousa  and  his  band  were 
literally  buried  with  boquets  of  flowers  of  the  choicest 
varieties.  In  Baden  as  in  Brussells  there  is  a  wide, 
deep,  yawning  chasm  between  the  elite  and  the  peas- 
antry. At  these  concerts  there  were  on  dress  parade 
representatives  of  fashion,  the  high  class  of  Germans, 
Switzers,  and  French  in  "gorgeous  array."  Looking 
out  from  the  gardens,  the  female  peasantry  could  be 
seen  either  lugging  great  milk  cans  from  door  to  door, 
or  leading  a  cow  to  the  residences  of  the  most  fastidi- 
ous, to  be  milked  in  sight  of  the  proprietress  to  insure 
a  pure  and  clean  article  of  the  lacteal  fluid,  or  in  com- 
mand of  a  dog  cart. 

The  evil  of  tipping,  which  has  fastened  itself  upon 


RAILROADING  ON  THE  CONTINENT.  69 

Europe  as  we  go  east  grows  more  perplexing.  At 
our  hotel  the  waiter  supplied  us  with  a  wash  bowl  and 
pitcher  of  water,  but  no  soap  nor  towels;  when  these 
were  ordered,  a  fee  was  demanded  not  in  language 
audible,  but  in  persuasive  smiles  and  an  acute  sanctity 
which  spoke  louder  than  words.  When  the  hour 
came  for  letter  writing,  there  was  the  pen  and  the 
paper  and  the  empty  ink-stand.  A  supply  of  ink 
meant  another  fee.  As  these  sordid  beggars  rely  on 
the  "tips"  for  a  livelihood,  one  does  not  really  object 
to  the  money  paid  as  much  as  the  wiles  of  the  propri- 
etor, who  resorts  to  this  method  of  wholesale  plunder 
of  his  guests.  The  frisky  waiters  at  the  tables  are 
blind  to  your  wants  and  deaf  to  your  entreaties,  un- 
less you  come  down  with  a  moderate  amount  of  cold 
cash.  The  head  porter  of  one  of  the  leading  Berlin 
hotels  is  said  to  have  not  only  contributed  his  services 
for  one  year  to  the  proprietor  of  the  hostelry,  but  to 
have  paid  $1,500  for  the  privilege  of  practicing  the 
customary  piracy  upon  the  guests  of  the  house.  No 
well  ordered,  well  regulated  mind  expects  something 
for  nothing,  but  the  great  mass  of  people  detest  the 
schemes  of  the  degenerate  frauds  who  are  plotting 
with  their  servants  to  make  them  pay  twice  for  what 
they  receive.  Submission  to  this  evil  is  the  only  high 
way  in  Europe  for  tourists  to  travel.  It  is  wisdom 
for  the  American  traveler  to  suppress  his  indignation, 
yield  to  the  intrigue  of  the  sagacious  gangs  and  make 
the  best  of  it.  May  America  ever  be  spared  the  whole- 
sale piratical  tipping  system  of  Europe. 

Five  hours  were   needed   to  cover  the   distance 
between   Baden-Baden   and   SchafFhausen   or   Rhine 


70  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

Falls.  This  was  across  a  country  marvelously  produc- 
tive and  with  scenery  romantic. 

Methods  of  cultivation  of  the  soil  were  along  prim- 
itive lines.  Ten  cows  could  be  seen  at  work  in  the 
fields  to  one  horse,  and  women  as  tillers  of  the  soil 
were  in  a  large  majority.  The  houses,  in  fact  all 
buildings,  are  thatched  with  straw,  the  roofs  usually 
coming  within  one  story  of  the  grounds,  suggesting 
to  the  sight-seer  an  immense  hood  rather  than  a  roof. 

Rhine  Falls,  a  thrifty  village  with  limited  hotel 
accommodations,  but  first-class  if  charges  are  a  fair 
criterion,  arrests  the  brief  attention  of  the  tourist  by 
reason  of  the  Falls  of  the  Rhine  being  in  the  center 
of  the  town.  These  blue  waters  rushing  on  over  the 
rapids  and  finally  over  a  perpendicular  fall,  make  a 
bewitching  spectacle,  especially  as  seen  in  the  even- 
ing when  illuminated  by  electric  lights,  having  a 
variety  of  colors. 

Leaving  Rhine  Falls  for  Lucerne,  we  entered 
Switzerland,  the  most  mountainous  country  of  Eu- 
rope. Although  composed  of  but  16,000  square  miles, 
a  majority  of  which  consists  of  mountains,  Switzer- 
land sustains  a  population  of  more  than  3,000,000 
inhabitants.  Every  foot  of  land  susceptible  of  culti- 
vation seemed  to  be  producing  a  crop  of  some  sort. 
The  Switzers  are  industrious,  prudent  and  economical, 
and  evidences  of  their  thrift  could  be  seen  everywhere. 
Lacking  in  farm  machinery  and  modern  processes  of 
production,  the  primitive  systems  observed  do  not 
fail  of  results ;  what  they  lack  in  the  adoption  of  latter 
day  inventions  is  partially  supplied  by  unremitting 
toil  and  honest  sweat. 


RAILROADING  ON  THE  CONTINENT.  71 

Arriving  at  the  foot  of  the  Rigi,  our  party  took 
seats  in  two  open  cars  and  were  by  a  plucky  little  loco- 
motive pushed  up  a  cog-road  to  the  summit  of  the 
mountain  6,000  feet  high.  It  was  a  wild,  picturesque 
trip,  trying  to  the  nerves  and  at  times  wonderfully 
inspiring.  From  the  summit  of  the  Rigi  may  be  seen 
hundreds  of  snow-clad  peaks,  some  near  at  hand, 
others  in  the  far  distance.  Forty-two  square  miles  of 
Switzerland  lies  buried  deep  under  the  eternal  snows 
and  glaciers,  and  although  the  mercury  in  the  valleys 
during  our  visit  ranged  in  the  nineties,  but  a  feeble 
impression  is  made  upon  the  snow-banks  and  glaciers. 
Time  has  had  the  effect  of  making  these  snow-banks 
as  solid  as  the  earth  upon  which  they  rest.  In  con- 
trast to  the  enervating  heat  at  the  foot  of  the  moun- 
tains, at  the  summit  we  found  a  temperature  border- 
ing upon  60  degrees  and  the  most  wholesome 
atmosphere  imaginable.  There  were  several  drinking 
places  offering  their  refreshments,  but  drinking  by 
our  tourists  was  limited  to  great  draughts  of  pure 
atmosphere.  With  the  snow-clad  Alps  on  the  one 
side  and  the  deep  fertile  valleys  on  the  other,  the 
scene  was  enchanting. 

Lucerne  down  in  the  distance  appeared  to  be  a 
little  one-story  hamlet,  and  as  we  were  to  remain 
there  two  days  there  was  much  solicitude  in  our  party 
regarding  the  probable  scanty  accommodations. 
From  this  mountain  peak  a  circuit  of  300  miles  is 
obtainable,  human  eyes  are  put  to  a  severe  test  in 
taking  in  this  vast  expanse  of  territory.  While  our 
ascent  at  times  seemed  perilous,  our  descent  to  Lake 
Lucerne  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  mountain  was 


72  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

doubly  so.  The  cog-road  was  much  more  steep,  and 
our  progress  less  satisfactory ;  we  crawled  down  to  the 
water's  edge  at  a  snail  pace  and  took  a  long  sigh  of 
relief  when  transferred  to  a  lake  steamer.  Everybody 
has  seen  or  read  of  Lake  Lucerne ;  its  dazzling  beauty 
and  its  attractive  fringes  cannot  be  exaggerated.  A 
trip  of  a  few  miles  landed  us  at  Lucerne,  a  city  of 
20,000  residents  and  three  times  20,000  tourists.  It  is 
claimed  that  a  million  guests  are  entertained  every 
year  at  Lucerne;  their  magnificent  hotels  have  a  ca- 
pacity for  entertaining  all  visitors,  and  few  Americans 
who  take  a  trip  through  Europe  skip  Lucerne,  and 
not  one  can  afford  to.  It  is  said  to  be  the  most  allur- 
ing and  inviting  spot  in  Europe. 

Fishing,  riding  on  the  lake  and  trips  to  the  summit 
of  Mount  Pilatus  are  the  principal  occupations  of  the 
travelers. 

Lucerne  has  an  old  tower,  an  arsenal  containing 
many  weapons  which  have  seen  service,  a  theater,  a 
library,  collections  of  natural  history,  and  factories 
where  silks,  cottons  and  gloves  are  turned  out. 

It  has  a  lion  28  feet  long  carved  in  the  face  of 
solid  rock  and  located  in  the  center  of  the  city.  This 
piece  of  art  was  dedicated  as  a  monument  to  786  sol- 
diers who,  in  1792,  were  butchered  by  a  Paris  mob; 
the  lion  appears  to  be  dying  from  the  effects  of  a 
spear  which  entered  his  shoulder  and  was  broken  off 
a  few  inches  from  the  surface.  The  old  fellow's  ex- 
pression of  agony  offers  a  most  striking  feature  of 
genuine  art. 

Vines  hang  down  the  cliff  and  a  clear  stream 
trickles  from  above  and  empties  into  a  pond  at  the 


RAILROADING  ON  THE  CONTINENT.  73 

base,  and  in  the  surface  of  the  pond  this  king  of  beasts 
is  reflected  among  the  water  lilies.  The  place  is  a 
sheltered,  woodland  nook,  removed  from  noise  and 
confusion ;  the  pond  is  the  home  of  some  black  swans, 
which  contribute  to  the  impressiveness  of  the  sur- 
roundings. 

From  Lucerne  to  Milan  through  the  Alps  is  one 
of  the  most  graphic  trips  imaginable.  Leaving  Lu- 
cerne by  the  picturesque  route  of  St.  Gothards  and 
passing  Lake  Como — said  to  be  the  handsomest  body 
of  water  in  the  world — the  scenes  grow  constantly 
wilder  and  more  menacing.  Valleys  narrow  to  gorges, 
precipices  become  more  giddy  and  the  double  tracks 
leading  into  the  yawning  tunnels  tell  us  that  from  our 
view  will  soon  be  practically  shut  out  the  bewilder- 
ment of  unique  bridges,  glacial  torrents,  battlements 
rockribbed  and  products  of  nature's  convulsions.  On 
every  hand  the  grandeur  of  the  panorama,  where  day- 
light is  admitted,  baffles  description. 

This  is  the  land  of  William  Tell,  the  hero  and  the 
ideal  of  our  boyhood.  The  romances,  the  myths,  and 
traditions  of  the  thirteenth  century,  having  the 
patriotism  of  the  great  Swiss  leader  for  a  basis,  are 
kept  fresh  in  the  minds  of  his  native  countrymen.  His 
slaying  of  Gessler,  the  tyrant,  who  compelled  him  to 
shoot  an  apple  from  his  boy's  head,  still  receives  the 
highest  commendation,  although  some  historians 
have  expressed  doubt  about  the  feat  having  been  per- 
formed. 

Nothing  in  the  world's  handiwork  of  wonders 
compares  with  the  famous  tunnels  of  the  Alps.  Un- 
like most  engineering  exploits  for  surmounting  high 


74  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

elevations  by  methods  visible  on  the  surface,  this 
great  feat  was  performed  way  down  within  the  depths 
of  solid  rock.  From  the  base  to  the  summit  of  the 
Alps  our  train  made  circle  after  circle,  through  tunnel 
after  tunnel,  from  five  to  ten  miles  in  length. 

These  tunnels  remind  one  of  the  work  of  an  im- 
mense auger  three-fourths  of  the  time,  while  doing 
its  work,  incased  in  the  wood  with  an  occasional  break 
through  to  the  surface  letting  in  daylight.  Through 
these  breaks,  our  passengers  caught  glimpses  of 
scenery  made  famous  in  poetry  and  song.  The  long- 
est tunnel,  nearly  ten  miles  in  length,  required  the 
labor  of  10,000  men  for  ten  years,  and  these  tunnels 
are  said  to  have  cost  the  Swiss  government  sixty 
million  dollars. 


SCENES  IN  THE  ALPS 


SUNNY  ITALY— ANTIQUE   MILAN— THE   EIGHTH  WONDER   OF  THE 

WORLD. 


Our  trip  through  the  longest  tunnel,  notwith- 
standing its  heavy  up  grade,  was  made  in  23  minutes. 
Any  American  failing  to  be  moved  or  to  get  inspira- 
tion from  the  sights  between  tunnels  along  this  route 
must  be  a  hopeless  stoic.  Description  of  the  rich 
emerald  green,  and  the  golden  tints  of  grain  in  the 
deep  valleys,  through  which  coursed  streams  of  blue 
snow  water,  not  unlike  a  long  stretch  of  blue  ribbon 
making  its  way  toward  the  Rhine,  pens  and  pencils 
utterly  fail  to  fittingly  describe.  These  valleys,  as  seen 
from  the  mountain  tops,  are  captivating.  The  land- 
scapes, as  viewed  in  the  glimpses  upward  along  the 
mountain  slopes,  are  hardly  less  interesting. 

The  terrace  above  terrace  consisting  of  stone  walls 
and  small  plateaus,  the  handiwork  of  the  Switzer 
peasant;  the  Swiss  cottages,  usually  made  of  logs, 
neat  and  home-like;  the  crops  produced  by  primitive 
methods  of  cultivation ;  the  general  air  of  thrift ;  the 
ruddy  faces  of  the  men  and  the  maidens,  breathing 
this  mountain  air,  combined  to  make  a  lasting  im- 
pression on  the  minds  of  our  party.  The  Switzer 
requires  but  little,  and  contentment,  the  greatest  of 
all  earthly  blessings,  is  his. 

To  my  question,  how  do  these  people  with  all 
their  industry  manage  to  live  in  a  country  not  unlike 
the  Rockies  of  America,  where  grizzlys,  antelopes  and 

76 


76  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

mountain  sheep  are  almost  the  sole  occupants,  the 
reply  was,  "Oh,  this  is  a  dairy  country."  "But  where 
are  the  cows?"  The  cows  are  away  on  the  summit  of 
the  mountain  and  over  on  the  other  slope,  where  fac- 
tories are  located  for  producing  the  highest  grades  of 
Swiss  cheese,  which  supplies  the  aristocracy  of  all 
civilized  countries.  My  informant  said  further :  "The 
Swiss  daughters  take  the  cows,  the  calves  and  the 
goats,  in  the  spring  as  soon  as  the  grass  and  herbage 
begins  to  show  itself,  drive  to  these  cheese  factories, 
where  they  remain  caring  for  the  stock  until  the  snows 
of  October  drive  them  homeward.  In  the  meantime, 
the  fathers,  mothers  and  sons  have  been  busy  in  culti- 
vating and  harvesting  the  crops  needed  for  wintering 
the  animals,  as  the  numerous  little  stacks  of  hay, 
fodder  and  corn  bore  evidence.  The  money  received 
from  the  cheese  factories,  together  with  the  vege- 
tables and  grain,  constitute  the  basis  for  independence 
and  comfortable  livelihood.  The  persistent  industry 
of  these  peasants  in  overcoming  the  hard  lines  of 
nature  to  be  contended  with  along  these  rocky 
heights,  is  worthy  of  the  highest  admiration. 

Added  to  the  scenes  described  were  the  numerous 
cascades  of  snow-white  water,  which  for  thousands  of 
feet  came  tumbling  from  the  snow-banks  of  the  moun- 
tain peaks.  Some  in  little  silver  threads,  others  of 
greater  volume,  suggesting  a  high  waterfall. 

Then  the  views  of  the  rugged  rocks,  the  shrub- 
bery of  evergreen,  the  wild  flowers  in  profusion  near 
the  base  of  the  mountain,  the  gleaming  of  a  lake  with 
its  sparkling  waters,  and  the  thriving  little  villages 
here  and  there — never  without  church  spires — added 


SCENES  IN  THE  ALPS.  77 

to  the  charms  of  the  landscapes.  At  the  stations 
along  the  route  little  girls  with  eidelweiss  for  sale, 
supplied  our  party  with  this  rare  flower,  which  blooms 
and  fades  under  the  very  breath  of  the  snow-banks, 
reaching  maturity  at  a  higher  altitude  than  any  other 
flower  in  the  world. 

From  all  parts  of  the  earth  gather  here,  during  the 
summer  months,  people  of  various  nationalities  to  fill 
the  hotels  and  boarding  houses  for  a  brief  season,  to 
receive  the  benefits  from  the  pure  mountain  air  and 
to  enjoy  this  fascinating  scenery.  Many  of  these 
hostelries  are  located  on  the  pinnacles  of  the  highest 
peaks  below  the  snow-capped  mountains.  Here 
invalids  are  invigorated  and  life  and  health  receives 
a  thrilling  impetus. 

Out  of  Switzerland  into  sunny  Italy,  popularly 
known  as  the  land  of  fruits  and  flowers.  Examina- 
tion of  our  baggage  by  a  gang  of  boodlers,  who  for  a 
small  price  paid  by  our  conductor  after  a  short  parley, 
secured  the  necessary  chalk-marks  on  our  leather 
trunks,  when  we  were  liberated  from  their  farcical 
clearing  house.  These  so-called  government  officials, 
in  ''knocking  down"  public  money  are  as  bold  as  a 
gang  of  Spanish  bandits. 

Northern  Italy  is  a  beautiful  country,  abounding 
in  vast  orchards  and  crops  of  grain,  including  great 
fields  of  Indian  corn. 

In  our  long  ride  to  Milan  we  were  scarcely  out  of 
sight  of  mulberry  trees,  from  which  silk  worms  are 
kept  busy  in  supplying  the  raw  material  for  one  of  the 
leading  industries  of  Italy.  These  trees,  fifteen  to 
twenty  feet  in  height,  set  in  long  rows,  are  usually 


78  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

made  to  support  the  everywhere  present  grapevines 
of  that  country.  Some  of  the  crops  of  grain  and  vege- 
tables grown  in  Italy  are  duplicated  each  year,  and  of 
some  varieties  three  crops  are  grown  on  the  same  land 
during  twelve  months. 

Farm  houses  are  usually  old,  small  and  out  of  date, 
lacking  in  the  elements  of  attractiveness  and  comfort. 
The  ordinary  farm  laborer  of  that  sunny  clime  is  a 
pinched,  inferior  specimen  of  humanity,  apparently 
leading  a  slavish  life,  lacking  in  education  a:id  dwarfed 
in  intellect.  Compensation  for  his  labor  is  small,  and 
if  he  has  been  so  fortunate  as  to  accumulate  and  be- 
come a  property  holder,  the  tax  gatherer  is  to  him  a 
nightmare. 

The  government  of  Italy,  in  the  support  of  its 
royalty  and  its  immense  standing  army,  taxes  its  sub- 
jects well-nigh  out  of  existence.  There  is  a  tax  upon 
everything  pleasant  to  see,  hear,  feel,  smell  or  taste. 
That  anarchism  should  be  one  of  the  leading  crops  of 
Italy  is  a  natural  sequence. 

The  assassination  of  King  Humbert,  cold-blooded 
and  heartless  as  it  was,  produced  but  little  sensation 
in  this  kingdom.  The  masses  seemed  to  take  it  in  a 
matter-of-fact  way  and  the  chatter  and  smiles  of  the 
laborers  were  full  of  significance.  Humbert  was  a 
good  king  as  Italian  kings  go,  but  hordes  of  Dagos 
"ag'in  the  government"  had  long  been  plotting  for 
his  life.  Humbert  was  a  good  financier,  both  for  him- 
self and  for  his  country.  During  his  reign  the  govern- 
ment had  been  relieved  of  many  of  its  burdens  and 
from  a  commercial  standpoint  had  been  lifted  out  of 
some  of  the  sloughs  of  despond,  all  of  which  counted 


SCENES  IN  THE  ALPS.  79 

as  nothing  with  thousands  of  anarchists  responsible 
for  the  bloody  deed. 

Our  first  stop  in  Italy  was  at  Milan,  second  in  size 
of  Italian  cities,  having  a  population  of  something 
more  than  300,000  inhabitants.  Milan  has  great  com- 
mercial advantages,  and  from  a  commercial  stand- 
point has  long  been  prominent.  Its  first  organization 
was  near  the  birth  of  the  Christian  era.  Twice  de- 
stroyed by  fire  and  sword,  it  rose  from  the  ashes,  and 
now,  barring  its  ancient  tinge,  is  one  of  the  finest 
cities  on  the  continent.  The  city  is  almost  circular, 
and  is  encompassed  on  three  sides  by  ramparts  and 
low  walls.  The  modern  portion  of  Milan  has  wide, 
regular  and  well-paved  streets.  Many  of  the  resi- 
dences are  imposing.  Its  principal  church — the 
famous  gothic  cathedral  Duomo,  the  eighth  wonder 
of  the  world — represents  a  Latin  cross  500  feet  long, 
250  feet  wide,  with  the  nave  150  feet  high  and  a  spire 
354  feet  high,  surmounted  by  a  well-developed  figure 
of  the  Madonna.  Six  hundred  years  have  been  con- 
sumed in  the  construction  of  this  edifice.  From  fifteen 
to  twenty  generations  of  skilled  architects  have  spent 
their  precious  lives  upon  this  dream  in  marble.  Gen- 
eration after  generation  of  laborers,  who  gathered  in 
swarms  to  assist  in  its  construction,  have  come  and 
gone  and  still  the  marvelous  pile  remains  unfinished. 
The  work  leading  toward  completion  is,  however, 
being  prosecuted  with  vigor.  The  cathedral  has  4,500 
statues  on  its  hundreds  of  pinnacles,  towers,  columns, 
turrets,  and  in  its  niches  and  alcoves.  A  climb  of  494 
steps  to  the  top  of  the  tower  secures  a  fine  view  of  the 
city  and  the  adjacent  plains  of  Lombardy,  the  great 


80  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

canals,  the  extensive  silk  manufactories,  and  the 
numerous  railroads  which  center  at  Milan. 

History  records  scenes  of  conflict  in  which  the  city 
has  been  besieged  eight  times  and  surrendered  to  its 
enemies  twenty-eight  times.  Trees  and  ornamental 
shrubbery  have  long  since  concealed  the  bristling 
cannon  and  other  weapons  of  defense  once  used  for 
the  protection  of  the  city. 

The  famous  fresco  of  'The  Last  Supper,"  by  Leo- 
nardo de  Vinci,  is  an  attraction  second  to  none  other 
in  Europe  in  the  way  of  art.  Located  in  an  old  con- 
vent now  used  for  a  soldiers'  barracks,  the  picture  has 
been  sadly  defaced  and  much  of  its  original  beauty 
destroyed.  Milan  boasts  of  the  finest  arcade  in  the 
world,  known  as  the  Victor  Emmanuel  galleries,  ex- 
tending across  the  block  in  both  directions,  orna- 
mented with  fine  statues  and  sheltered  by  a  roof  of 
semi-circular  glass,  in  the  center  of  which  is  an  im- 
mense glass  dome.  It  is  here  that  the  ladies  of  the 
elite  and  well-to-do  people  gather  to  do  shopping  and 
indulge  in  Italian  gossip.  The  picture  gallery  of 
Milan  described  in  detail  would  exhaust  the  reader. 
The  old  masters,  including  Raphael  and  Michael  An- 
gelo,  are  in  evidence.  The  interior  of  the  great 
cathedral  offers  most  potent  reasons  for  criticism  of 
Italian  extravagance.  Millions  of  dollars  are  there 
tied  up  in  ornaments  of  the  most  expensive  varieties. 
Gold  and  precious  stones  almost  without  limit  enter 
into  the  grand  display.  Down  in  the  basement  we 
were  shown  the  sarcophagus  containing  the  remains 
of  an  archbishop,  who  for  300  years  had  been  resting 
under  jewels  valued  at  $1?000?000,  This  dead 


SCENES  IN  THE  ALPS.  81 

gation  of  wealth  is  preserved  intact  in  spite  of  the 
poverty  of  the  swarms  of  beggars  whose  appeals  for 
a  mere  pittance,  just  enough  to  prolong  their  miser- 
able lives,  rings  in  the  ears  of  every  visitor  at  Milan. 
These  pitiful  geniuses,  many  of  them  old  and  decrepit, 
followed  us  across  the  threshold  of  the  cathedral  dis- 
turbing the  sanctity  of  the  confessionals  with  their 
imperious  demands  for  something  that  would  satisfy 
either  their  wolfish  hunger  of  their  mercenary  greed 
for  money. 


ANTIQUATED  VENICE 


DEPARTED  GLORY— BLUSTERING  GONDOLIERS— MECCA  FOR  THE 
SMALL  BOY. 


The  peninsula  of  Italy  extending  from  the  Alps 
southward  and  including  Sicily  and  Sardinia,  makes 
a  stretch  of  more  than  seven  hundred  miles. 

There  is  a  marked  diversity  in  both  the  conditions 
of  the  inhabitants  and  the  quality  of  the  country  as 
deterioration  is  the  rule  as  the  southern  limit  is 
approached.  In  the  northern  portion  the  country  is 
more  fertile,  the  people  are  better  nourished  and 
better  developed  physically  and  intellectually  than  in 
the  southern  portion. 

The  Italians,  who  come  to  America  to  build  our 
railroads  and  sell  bananas,  live  in  tents,  work  for  low 
wages  and  subsist  upon  hard  bread  and  weak  coffee, 
hail  from  the  southern  portion  of  the  kingdom,  which 
has  long  been  over-crowded  and  where  civilization 
has  a  flimsy  and  uncertain  footing. 

Our  entry  into  Venice  was  awaited  by  a  large  fleet 
of  gondolas.  There  was  the  usual  hackman's  rivalry 
for  patronage,  to  see  whose  boat  should  be  filled  first 
and  who  could  secure  the  largest  slice  of  our  party, 
which  had  no  choice  of  routes  or  methods  of  trans- 
portation. A  wide  stretch  of  blue  water  between  the 
depot  and  our  point  of  destination  gave  the  gondoliers 
a  monopoly;  but  these  noisy,  exuberant  and  enthus- 
iastic Venetians  gave  abundant  evidence  that  they 
had  not  been  attacked  by  the  trust  epidemic  and  that 


ANTIQUATED  VENICE.  83 

competition  in  their  lines  of  work  was  keen.  The 
gondoliers  of  Venice,  numbered  by  thousands,  are 
extremely  loquacious  and  pugnacious.  They  fight 
freely  with  their  tongues,  but  rarely  strike;  their  riots 
are  free  from  bloodshed ;  they  are  tall,  muscular  and 
robust.  Their  exhibitions  of  strength  and  skill  in  pro- 
pelling their  boats  is  often  astonishing.  They  have 
voices  that  would  make  the  forest  tremble,  if  there 
was  a  forest;  they  are  nearly  all  singers  and  are  all 
lovers  of  music. 

To  the  reader  of  history  Venice  at  sight  proves  a 
disappointment.  Its  splendor,  beauty  and  original 
magnificence  has  long  since  departed.  Time,  the  ex- 
acting mistress,  has  quietly  and  silently  erased  its  gilt 
and  annihilated  its  once  fascinating  and  captivating 
splendor.  The  Venice  of  story  and  song  has  departed ; 
the  magnificent,  invincible  Venice,  which  for  more 
than  a  dozen  centuries  kept  prestige  of  leadership  of 
commercial  prosperity  of  all  the  cities  of  the  world, 
has  collapsed.  The  city  has  been  robbed  of  her  glory 
by  centralization  of  commerce  in  other  localities.  Her 
fleets  known  in  the  remotest  oceans,  which  a  thousand 
years  ago  gathered  and  distributed  the  products  of 
every  clime,  have  long  since  gone  to  decay ;  her  piers 
are  deserted;  her  warehouses  are  empty,  and  all  that 
remains  of  a  once  commercial  center  is  a  memory. 
That  memory,  however,  answers  her  present  inhabi- 
tants a  good  purpose.  The  crop  of  tourists,  which  in 
a  steady  stream  contribute  to  the  filling  of  her  coffers, 
are  paying  tribute  to  the  Venice  of  palmy  days;  her 
present  poverty,  her  humiliation  and  her  reverses  have 
not  proved  potent  enough  to  turn  the  tide  of  foreign 


84  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

curiosity  away  from  this  venerable  autocrat  of  com- 
merce and  relic  of  former  grandeur. 

Venice  was  built  originally  upon  about  one  hun- 
dren  islands,  seventy-five  of  which  are  left,  spaces 
being  filled  in  between  the  others.  Between  these 
islands  the  waterways  or  canals  extend  in  every  direc- 
tion ;  these  waterways  are  supplied  by  the  sea  and  are 
affected  by  the  rising  and  falling  of  the  tides.  About 
three  hundred  bridges  large  and  small  connect  these 
islands. 

As  no  horses  are  used  in  the  city  and  no  heavy 
loads  cross  the  bridges,  they  are  usually  narrow  and 
cheaply  built  structures.  Everybody  has  seen  a  pic- 
tureof  the  bridge  of  the  Rialto,  which  crosses  the  grand 
canal,  having  a  span  of  91  feet.  It  was  a  structure  of  rare 
beauty  a  few  centuries  ago,  and  of  great  disappoint- 
ment to  our  visitors  because  of  its  ancient  and  dilapi- 
dated appearance.  Around  the  Rialto  history  and 
fiction  have  located  much  with  which  the  world  has 
become  familiar.  Here  was  located  Shakespeare's 
Merchant  of  Venice,  the  house  of  the  money  changers 
and  the  home  of  Shylock.  The  rooms  occupied  by 
the  money  changers  in  Shakespeare's  Merchant  of 
Venice  now  form  a  part  of  an  extensive  fish  market, 
while  at  the  other  end  of  the  bridge  the  home  of  Shy- 
lock  is  being  occupied  as  a  government  postoffice — • 
where  I  went  through  winding  and  narrow  streets  to 
receive  my  mail.  Like  most  other  buildings  in  the 
city,  their  value  for  business  or  residence  purposes 
has  greatly  depreciated.  Their  antiquated,  old-fash- 
ioned architecture,  although  dignified  with  historical 
reminiscences,  suffers  for  want  of  ordinary  care  and 


ANTIQUATED  VENICE.  85 

preservation.  Venice,  like  all  Italian  cities,  is  heavily 
loaded  with  a  coat  of  dirt  and  its  venerable  presence  is 
to  be  regretted,  especially  when  its  resting  place 
happens  to  be  upon  the  beautiful  mosaics,  upon  the 
highly  polished  marble  of  rare  qualities,  upon  the 
tables,  vases,  tapestry,  paintings,  sculpture  and  scores 
of  other  exquisite  specimens  of  art  that  centuries  ago 
were  the  pride  of  the  city  and  the  delight  of  the  ad- 
mirers of  well-kept  and  well-preserved  handiwork  of 
the  great  masters. 

Venice  is  noted  for  its  pretty  women  and  dirty 
faced,  neglected  children;  with  its  copious  supply  of 
water  the  inhabitants  should  be  the  cleanest  in  the 
world  and  a  war  upon  the  dirt  of  the  city  would 
surely  terminate  in  a  victory  of  the  assilants. 

Venice  is  a  Mecca  for  the  small  boy.  Such  a  thing 
as  hoeing  in  the  garden,  milking  the  cow  or  driving 
her  to  pasture  never  enters  into  his  calculations  or 
disturbs  the  sweetness  of  his  morning  nap.  Taking 
a  swim,  instead  of  meaning  a  tramp  away  to  a  muddy 
pond,  he  strips  off  in  his  own  home,  jumps  from  his 
own  threshold  and  gets  all  the  benefits  of  a  bath  in 
the  ocean.  It  is  not  uncommon  to  see  mothers  assist- 
ing their  little  ones  in  the  art  of  swimming.  In  one 
case  I  noticed  three  little  "tots"  at  the  other  end  of 
some  ropes  ten  or  fifteen  feet  in  length,  fastened 
around  their  bodies,  while  the  mother  was  holding  on 
to  the  frisky  little  cherubs  and  watching  their  gambols 
in  the  sea  fronting  her  modest  residence. 

As  a  quiet  retreat  for  invalids  Venice  must  be  an 
ideal  spot,  as  save  the  clarion  voices  of  the  gondolier 
the  city  is  favored  with  a  graveyard  stillness.  There 


86  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

are  no  steam  whistles,  electric  cars,  omnibuses,  milk 
or  ice  wagons  rattling  over  stony  streets  to  disturb 
morning  sleepers  or  rack  the  nerves  and  patience  of 
invalids.  The  pavements  are  all  constructed  of  wood 
resting  on  piles  numbered  by  hundreds  of  thousands. 

The  Venetian  laborer  seems  a  quiet,  indifferent 
person,,  and  as  it  takes  but  little  to  keep  soul  and  body 
together,  is  usually  found  resting  on  the  benches  or 
getting  the  benefit  of  summer  heat  on  the  sunny  side 
of  a  public  building.  If  he  was  not  born  tired,  his 
appearance  is  deceiving. 

The  main  reliance  for  food  of  the  middle  and  lower 
classes  is  fish  and  macaroni.  The  Italians  are  skilled 
in  the  art  of  making  macaroni  palatable,  cheap  and 
wholesome.  The  operations  of  fishermen  and  the 
conduct  of  the  fish  markets  are  regulated  by  statute. 
The  sale  of  dead  fish  is  prohibited  by  a  law  strictly 
enforced.  They  are  caught  in  great  quantities  in  the 
waters  adjacent  to  the  city  and  brought  in  in  baskets, 
towed  through  the  water  behind  the  boats.  The  pur- 
chaser usually  receives  his  fish  direct  from  the  basket 
when  lifted  from  the  water,  and  the  price  put  upon 
some  of  the  varieties  is  very  low.  There  are  few  enter- 
prises in  the  city  employing  labor,  the  manufacture  of 
lace  taking  the  lead.  I  saw  hundreds  of  girls  crowded 
into  dingy,  ill-ventilated  rooms,  wearing  out  their 
nimble  fingers  in  the  production  of  fine  laces;  their 
compensation  ranged  from  sixteen  to  twenty-four 
cents  a  day.  The  prices  asked  for  the  goods  seemed 
to  warrant  more  pay,  but  the  poor  operatives  are  not 
protected  by  labor  unions  or  co-operation  and  are 
compelled  to  accept  whatever  the  employers  are  gen- 


ANTIQUATED  VENICE.  87 

erous  enough  to  offer.  The  lady  contingent  of  our 
party  fairly  raved  over  some  of  the  elegant  patterns 
and  fine  quality  of  the  goods.  Many  an  American 
dollar  drops  into  the  slot  in  payment  for  these  coveted 
articles.  How  to  extract  the  largest  amount  of  cash 
from  the  pockets  of  the  tourists  is  the  leading  propo- 
sition with  all  Venetians.  It's  the  study  of  their  lives 
from  the  cradle  to  the  grave.  The  art  of  begging  is 
an  early  lesson,  the  little  juveniles  become  experts  in 
the  business.  These  leeches  are  hard  to  shake  off; 
when  everything  else  fails,  they  will  fall  down  in 
front  of  you  and  try  to  block  the  way  until  their  de- 
mands are  complied  with. 

The  quantity  and  variety  of  bric-a-brac,  knick- 
knacks  and  souvenirs  for  sale  in  Venice  is  astonishing. 
The  stores  dealing  in  the  same  are  numbered  by 
hundreds  and  the  prices  are  usually  much  lower  than 
the  same  goods  can  be  bought  for  in  America.  Amer- 
icans are  the  best  customers  and  the  Venetian  harvest 
from  this  source  lasts  all  the  year. 


VENETIAN  ENTERPRISE  AND  ANCIENT 
ARISTOCRACY 


RULE   OF    THE   DOGES— INHUMAN    TREATMENT   OF    CRIMINALS- 
GILDED  AGE  SUPERSEDED  BY   POVERTY  AND  DIRT. 


No  authentic  history  of  Venice  dates  back  of  the 
fifth  century,  when  the  marshy  islands  served  as  tem- 
porary retreats  from  barbarian  invasions,  and  the  first 
permanent  settlement  dates  from  the  beginning  of  the 
ninth  century.  The  physical  condition  of  the  islands 
to  be  contended  with  were  unpropitious  and  unsuited 
for  the  growth  and  progress  of  a  large  and  prosperous 
city.  There  was  lack  of  serviceable  timber,  drinkable 
water  was  almost  out  of  the  question,  and  the  neces- 
sity of  building  upon  piles  was  universal. 

The  spirit  of  enterprise  which  possessed  the  Vene- 
tians would  not  down.  All  obstacles  were  overcome 
by  their  genius  and  push  in  building  and  manning 
fleets  sufficient  to  control  the  commerce  of  the  world. 
For  seven  or  eight  hundred  years  the  prestige  attained 
by  their  push  was  held  in  spite  of  all  rivalry.  Their  form 
of  government,  that  of  an  aristocratic  republic,  was 
adopted  at  an  early  period ;  later,  or  in  the  beginning 
of  the  seventh  century,  there  was  a  change,  giving 
popular  representation  to  a  doge  or  a  duke,  a  sort  of 
chief  magistrate  clothed  with  supreme  power.  The 
selection  and  dominant  ruling  of  the  doges  lasted  for 
many  centuries  and  during  their  reign  the  city  became 
a  center  of  wealth,  fashion,  extravagance  and  cruelty. 
The  value  of  human  life  was  uncertain  and  of  low 
ss 


VENETIAN  ENTERPRISE.  89 

estimate.  The  doges  generally  ruled  with  an  iron  rod, 
and  although  their  words  were  law,  the  tables  not 
unfrequently  were  turned  upon  them  and  they  suf- 
fered the  cruelties  and  the  tortures  that  they  had  been 
guilty  of  imposing  upon  others.  In  one  case  history 
accounts  for  the  skinning  alive  of  a  doge;  others  were 
condemned  and  suffered  tortuous  deaths;  and  still 
others  were  punished  by  having  their  eyes  put  out. 
Inhuman  treatment  of  criminals  at  the  present  day 
hardly  has  a  parallel  to  Venice  in  any  other  city  of  the 
world.  I  crossed  the  "Bridge  of  Sighs"  and  walked 
around  the  prison  where  300  life  convicts  were  eking 
out  an  unfortunate  existence.  A  good  share  of  these 
miserable  prisoners  are  located  below  the  water  line 
in  small,  dark,  damp  cells.  Many  of  them  are  only 
two  feet  by  six  feet,  and  known  as  "coffin  cells,"  where 
no  streak  of  daylight  is  allowed  to  enter.  The  thick 
walls  which  separate  them  forbid  all  intercourse.  They 
see  no  living  being  except  a  guard,  who  twice  each  day 
delivers  to  them  a  scanty  ration.  We  were  informed 
that  their  cells  were  alive  with  vermin  and  destitute 
of  everything  which  contributes  to  human  comfort. 
The  average  period  of  life  spent  in  this  prison  is  only 
about  one  year,  insanity  being  the  means  of  terminat- 
ing the  existence  of  the  largest  number.  There  are 
tales  told  of  the  guards  taking  these  poor  lunatics  out 
at  dead  of  night,  sailing  away  in  a  gondola  two  or 
three  miles,  attaching  weights  to  their  limbs  and 
dropping  them  into  the  sea;  this,  although  a  crime, 
is  a  merciful  one,  if  half  the  stories  told  of  their  tor- 
tures are  true. 

In  literature  and  art  Venice  in  the  middle  ages 


90  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

rose  to  the  standard  of  Greece.  Inventive  genius  gave 
the  city  distinction.  There  were  costly  tissues  made, 
they  manufactured  gunpowder  and  glass,  their  paint- 
ings and  architecture,  their  sculpture  and  their 
decorations  still  in  existence  were  of  the  highest  order. 

The  Doges  palace  is  a  marvel  of  beauty,  elegance 
and  costly  ornamentation.  The  wealth  piled  up  in  its 
construction  and  finish  would  be  difficult  to  estimate. 
The  ceilings  of  some  of  the  large  rooms  are  still  cover- 
ed with  a  sheet  of  gold.  From  our  guide  I  tried  to  get 
an  estimate  of  its  value  but  failed.  These  rooms  were 
a  reminder  of  the  description  of  Solomon's  temple. 

St.  Mark's  square,  located  centrally,  is  the  chief 
attraction  of  Venice.  It  comprises  perhaps  two  or 
three  acres  of  pavement  and  is  entirely  surrounded 
with  ancient  blocks,  palaces  and  stores.  A  cathedral 
and  the  Doges'  palace  filling  one  side  of  the  square. 
Here  at  a  glance  you  get  a  view  of  enough  of  historic 
Venice  to  keep  an  ordinary  mortal  busy  studying  for 
a  month.  The  Doges'  palace,  the  cathedral,  the  mint, 
and  library,  the  royal  palace,  with  many  other  public 
buildings,  are  filled  with  choice  relics  of  the  long,  long 
ago.  In  the  cathedral  there  are  two  alabaster  col- 
umns, two  feet  in  diameter,  taken  from  Solomon's 
temple.  A  lighted  match  held  behind  one  of  these 
columns  settled  its  transparency,  and  its  power  to 
illumine  with  amber  glory.  There  is  on  exhibition 
what  purports  to  be  the  robe  of  Jesus,  a  portion  of 
earth  from  Mount  Calvary  wet  once  from  his  blood,  a 
fragment  of  the  true  cross  upon  which  he  suffered, 
with  many  other  relics  of  like  interest,  but  should  the 
truth  of  their  genuiness  be  questioned,  or  disputed, 


VENETIAN  ENTERPRISE.  91 

there  would  be  danger  of  disappointment  to  the  over- 
credulous.  The  vast  collection  of  paintings  will  not 
permit  of  enumeration.  Several  hundred,  for  instance, 
are  credited  to  each  one  of  the  old  masters,  and  hun- 
dreds to  artists  unknown  to  fame  outside  of  Italy. 
The  painting  of  the  Glory  of  Paradise,  by  Tintoretto, 
located  in  the  Doges'  palace,  78  by  32  feet,  is  modestly 
claimed  to  be  the  largest  oil  painting  in  the  world.  It 
attracts  the  largest  crowd  of  any  picture  that  it  was 
my  fortune  to  see  and  if  I  were  to  venture  an  opinion 
it  would  be  that  as  a  specimen  of  art  it  is  worthy  of  all 
the  admiration  it  receives.  The  winged  Lion  of  St. 
Mark  with  an  open  Bible  under  his  paw,  as  an  attrac- 
tive emblem  has  few  rivals  in  the  old  city. 

The  clock  tower,  the  four  gilt  bronze  horses  (the 
only  horses  in  the  city),  the  church  of  the  Jesuits  fin- 
ished with  marbles  of  a  variety  of  colors  from  the 
Orient  and  decorated  with  porphyry  and  alabaster  are 
attractions  which  deeply  impress  the  tourist.  Under 
this  old  Jesuit  church,  which  took  fifty-six  years  to 
erect,  many  of  the  piles  have  rotted  and  given  way, 
allowing  the  floor  to  settle  in  spots  from  one  to  two 
feet. 

With  the  glory  and  valor  of  Venice  has  departed 
the  beauty  of  all  its  exposed  decorations.  Its  marble 
palaces  resemble  sand-stone  from  a  distance,  but 
barring  the  dirt,  the  golden  stair-cases,  the  broad, 
marble  stairways,  the  gilded  stuccos  and  frescos,  retain 
their  richness  and  are  in  a  good  state  of  preservation. 

St.  Mark's  square  and  its  surrounding  is  the  pre- 
empted home  of  thousands  of  doves,  being  supported 
by  a  legacy  provided  in  the  will  of  an  old  lady  some 


92  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

time  a  resident  of  Venice.  These  doves  are  fed  about 
two  p.  m.  when  they  gather  in  clouds  to  receive  their 
rations.  The  birds  have  become  so  domesticated  that 
they  light  upon  not  only  their  benefactors,  but  upon 
the  spectators  by  dozens. 

The  population  of  Venice  is  about  150,000,  one- 
fourth  of  which  are  said  to  be  paupers.  Indolence  and 
laziness  seems  to  be  stamped  upon  the  laboring 
classes,  but  there  is  little  in  the  ancient  city  to  excite 
ambition.  Enterprise  is  smothered  by  the  universal 
desire  to  get  something  for  nothing,  or  to  pluck  the 
tourist  for  the  means  of  an  indifferent  livelihood.  The 
oriental  magnificence  and  extravagance,  the  millions 
of  gold  used  by  the  ancients  in  building  and  ornamen- 
tation is  all  dead  wealth,  preserved  and  existing  in  the 
center  of  misery,  degradation  and  pauperism. 

We  spent  an  afternoon  visiting  the  Adriatic  four 
miles  away,  and  bathing  in  its  green  waters.  Our 
party  filled  fifteen  gondolas,  which  were  lashed  to- 
gether and  propelled  by  the  most  skillful  and  stalwart 
specimens  of  the  gondoliers  art.  A  band  of  vocal  and 
instrumental  music  filled  one  of  the  boats,  and  their 
patriotic  airs  were  full  of  sweetness  though  to  us  lack- 
ing sentimentality  as  they  were  all  Italian,  or  Greek  to 
us.  In  nearly  every  song  the  gondoliers  joined  in  on 
the  chorus  and  their  exhilaration  was  not  wanting  in 
giving  emphasis  to  the  harmony  and  pathos,  which 
charmed  the  Americans.  The  bath  houses  along  the 
shore  of  the  Adriatic  are  very  extensive,  making  a 
popular  resort  for  all  tourists  visiting  Venice  in  the 
summer  months. 

We  returned  to  Venice  in  the  evening  and  its 


VENETIAN  ENTERPRISE.  93 

approach  upon  the  water  under  its  profusion  of  elec- 
tric lights  and  music,  both  vocal  and  instrumental, 
combined  to  create  the  charm  of  a  life  time. 

In  Venice  there  is  but  one  step  from  the  sublime  to 
the  horrible.  I  will  not  weary  the  reader  further  by  an 
attempt  at  description  of  royal  scenes,  as  they  existed 
in  the  middle  ages,  the  elaborate  tables,  furniture, 
vases,  marbles  and  tapestry  of  every  kind  and  descrip- 
tion, nor  of  the  ax  and  block  where  criminals  by 
thousands  were  publicly  executed.  Crime  in  those 
days  consisting  of  too  much  patriotism  or  too  little, 
too  much  religion  or  too  little  (either  of  which  was 
punishable  by  public  decapitation),  and  if  not  guilty  of 
either  of  these  charges,  an  enemy,  if  a  man  of  in- 
fluence, asked  that  a  life  be  taken  his  wish  was  granted. 

Poor  dilapidated  dingy,  dirty,  dull  old  Venice.  To 
be  weak  is  miserable,  to  depend  upon  charity  for  sup- 
port, or  to  prey  upon  your  fellowmen  for  something  to 
sustain  life,  and  to  get  something  for  nothing,  is 
neither  ennobling  nor  patriotic,  but  the  evidence  of 
fallen  greatness,  the  memories  of  a  gilded  age  cannot 
help  warming  every  sympathetic  nature  which  con- 
nects the  sorrowful  present  with  the  prosperous  dead 
past.  In  spite  of  the  poverty,  the  dirt,  the  blood- 
thirsty mosquitos,  the  fleas,  and  the  human  parasites, 
the  memory  of  the  three  days  spent  in  Venice  will 
linger  with  a  large  degree  of  satisfaction  while  life 
lasts. 


FLORENCE  THE  HOME  OF  ART 


ANCIENT    ARCHITECTURE— DONKEYS    AND    DIRT— THE    RESTING 
PLACE  OF  ARTISTS  AND  POETS  OF  DISTINCTION. 


Our  route  from  Venice  to  Florence  through  the 
Apennines,  and  through  forty-five  tunnels,  sharply 
contrasted  with  the  railroad  experiences  for  a  few  days 
previous.  These  tunnels,  without  light,  or  ventilation, 
are  the  foulest  things  imaginable.  The  gas  generated 
by  the  locomotive  is  suffocating,  and  the  odor  is  any- 
thing but  agreeable.  The  Apennines  are  rugged  and 
rocky,  in  many  places  they  reach  well  up  toward  the 
clouds,  creating  a  necessity  for  the  railroads  to  go 
through  rather  than  over  the  mountains.  Some  of  the 
scenery  is  fine.  Hemp  is  one  of  the  leading  crops  on 
the  low  lands,  which  largely  consists  of  clay,  and  hard 
clay  at  that. 

Florence  is  a  city  of  about  200,000  inhabitants. 
No  visitor  would  for  a  moment  question  its  antiquity. 
It  is  not  as  old  as  the  Apennines,  but  its  origin  ante- 
'dates  the  Christian  era.  It  has  a  cathedral,  which 
Julius  Caesar  gets  the  credit  for  erecting. 

Florence  is  the  home  of  art.  This  prestige  has 
been  its  leading  asset  for  centuries.  It  has  a  multitude 
of  artists,  who  are  constantly  fashioning  its  rough 
marble  into  statuary  of  every  kind  and  description. 
From  its  little  marble  statues,  six  inches  in  height, 
to  great  monuments  thirty  feet  in  height,  excelling 
in  artistic  conception  and  exquisite  finish.  Florence 
is  pre-eminent. 

94  ,     .,    , 


FLORENCE   THE   HOME    OF   ART.  95 

The  aptitude  and  dexterity  shown  by  some  of 
these  workmen  is  marvelous.  Out  of  a  rough  block 
of  marble  they  can  make  you  a  small  sized  statue 
while  you  wait.  These  Italians  are  born  artists  and 
seem  to  be  fitted  for  little  else. 

In  the  Uffizi  art  gallery  we  saw  miles  and  miles  of 
paintings  and  statuary.  Someone  has  said  that  that 
portion  of  the  gallery  known  as  the  Tribune  was  the 
richest  room  in  the  world.  "A  heart  that  draws  all 
hearts  to  it."  Here  was  the  Venus  de  Medici,  the 
painting  of  Venus  by  Titian,  also  some  of  Raphael's 
finest  masterpieces,  a  Madonna  and  a  St.  John, 
Titian's  Magdaline  and  St.  Catherine  are  in  this  grand 
collection.  In  this  great  gallery  was  what  is  claimed 
to  be  the  oldest  picture  in  the  world.  It  would  hardly 
win  a  prize  as  a  specimen  of  fine  art. 

To  us  the  most  interesting  spot  in  the  city  was  the 
church  of  Santa  Croce,  as  it  contains  the  tomb  of 
Dante,  by  far  the  greatest  of  all  Italian  poets.  Al- 
though Dante  passed  away  nearly  six  hundred  years 
ago,  having  spent  his  life  in  Florence,  his  memory  is 
venerated  with  a  tenderness  that  is  unusual. 

In  this  church  or  cathedral  are  also  the  tombs  of 
Michael  Angelo,  Machiavelli,  Rossini,  Petrarch,  Leo- 
nardo di  Vinci,  Cellini  and  Andrea  del  Sarto,  all  of 
whom  were  either  born  or  spent  the  most  of  their 
lives  in  this  city.  Each  of  these  men  of  genius  have 
a  sarcophagus  worthy  of  their  illustrious  names.  Santa 
Croce  is  the  Westminister  Abbey  of  Florence. 

Florence  is  not  a  paradise  of  beauty,  as  many 
writers  would  have  us  believe.  The  city  is  represented 
with  every  variety  of  architecture.  Some  of  its  build- 


96  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

ings,  evidently  imposing  and  interesting  in  the  middle 
ages,  have  long  since  passed  into  the  sere  and  yellow 
leaf,  and  the  dirt  which  afflicted  Venice  is  too  palp- 
able to  warrant  a  close  inspection.  Donkeys,  beggars 
and  dirt,  are  first  and  foremost  in  the  physical  makeup 
of  Florence.  Aside  from  artistic  work  there  are  few 
enterprises  employing  labor,  and  a  visit  to  the  suburbs 
and  the  streets  where  the  laboring  classes  are  in  multi- 
tude indicated  that  there  was  little  to  earn  and  many 
to  keep.  The  poor  little  abused  donkey  is  a  prolific 
subject  of  commiseration.  He  does  the  work  assigned 
to  the  horses  and  dogs  in  Brussells  and  Cologne.  We 
saw  the  little  scrawny,  half-starved  brutes  drawing  at 
least  four  times  the  weight  of  the  animal,  and  on  the 
top  of  the  loads  were  sitting  great,  lubberly,  lazy 
drivers.  When  a  sharp  incline  was  reached  and  the 
scratching  of  the  little  donkey  brought  him  to  his 
knees  and  he  could  go  no  further  the  driver  would 
climb  down  and  assist  him  up  the  grade  by  a  long 
pull  and  a  strong  pull  at  the  little  fellow's  head.  Here 
was  an  excellent  field  for  a  humane  society.  Supt. 
Chapman  would  have  his  hands  full  reforming  these 
soulless  vagrants. 

Everybody  has  heard  of  the  Arno,  the  "broad 
river"  which  courses  through  the  center  of  Florence. 
It  is  historical,  but  not  ideal. 

Instead  of  a  great  channel  of  clear  sparkling  water, 
we  found  it  a  good  sized  creek,  with  possibly  three 
feet  of  water  in  the  deepest  places  and  such  water, 
why,  it  was  a  reminder  of  our  own  Black  river  (though 
the  water  was  not  as  thick)  after  a  series  of  showers 
have  washed  the  cornlands  of  Carlisle.  Mark  Twain 


FLORENCE   THE    HOME    OF   ART.  97 

said  that  the  Arno  would  be' a  very  plausible  river  if 
they  would  pump  some  water  into  it,  but  we  were 
there  during  a  drought — and  possibly  the  rainy  sea- 
son would  have  the  effect  to  enlarge  our  vision.  As 
water  and  soap  find  little  use  with  the  middle  and 
lower  classes  of  the  city,  what  to  our  party  seemed 
a  scarcity  may  not  be  apparent  to  the  Italians.  Al- 
though the  list  of  fine  things  in  Florence  is  a  long 
one,  there  has  been  an  unpardonable  exaggeration 
of  its  loveliness  as  a  city.  Were  its  works  of  art  elimin- 
ated there  would  be  little  left  to  admire.  True  it  has 
some  well-ordered  public  gardens  on  a  high  eminence 
east  of  the  city.  There  are  some  mountains  in  the 
distance,  there  are  some  fragments  of  old  city  walls 
and  towers  and  other  ancient  relics,  which  might  be 
raked  out  of  the  dust  of  antiquity  and  made  interest- 
ing. 

The  botanical  gardens,  affording  a  grand  oppor- 
tunity for  students  in  botany,  are  well  kept  and  have 
varieties  of  shrubbery  and  flowers  which  are  unknown 
to  Americans. 

A  monument  to  King  David  by  Michael  Angelo, 
more  than  20  feet  high,  is  the  central  figure  on  the 
heights  adjoining  the  city,  and  by  good  judges  is 
pronounced  an  excellent  product  of  artistic  genius. 

The  grave  of  Elizabeth  Barrett  Browning  in  their 
well-kept  cemetery  attracted  the  notice  of  our  party. 
Although  laid  to  rest  forty  years  ago  the  fame  of  this 
distinguished  English  poetess  is  not  in  the  least 
dimmed.  After  her  marriage  to  Robert  Browning, 
the  poet,  they  resided  chiefly  in  Italy.  Mrs.  Brown- 


98  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

ing,  although  lacking  vigor  and  always  in  delicate 
health,  as  a  champion  of  Italy  and  her  welfare  had 
few  if  any  equals  as  a  writer  of  her  time.  Depth  of 
feeling,  genuine  pathos  and  noble  sentiment  charac- 
terized her  productions. 

If  Florence  has  a  fad  it  is  in  the  equipment  of  her 
police  department,  which  is  made  up  of  ornamental 
specimens,  if  not  useful ;  the  whole  force  seemed  to 
belong  to  the  "Captain  Jinks"  order;  their  embroid- 
ered swallow  tailed  coats  and  cocked  hats  entitles 
them  to  the  sobriquet  of  dudes. 

The  cripples,  consisting  of  the  club-footed,  the 
withered  hand  and  other  physical  deformities,  are 
shockingly  numerous  in  this  old  city.  In  traveling 
the  streets  you  are  rarely  free  from  their  appeals  for 
charity ;  the  piteous  tones  of  the  beggars,  the  women 
clothed  in  rags  lugging  their  little  ones  to  and  fro, 
created  impressions  that  one  would  gladly  shake  off. 

From  its  earliest  history  Florence  has  been  noted 
for  its  high  standards  of  literature,  and  through  all 
the  centuries  down  to  the  present  time  that  standard 
is  said  to  have  been  maintained.  Its  highest  grades 
of  society,  or  the  upper  classes,  are  readily  recognized 
by  their  refined  manners,  their  evident  culture  and 
their  suavity.  We  have  never  come  in  contact  with 
a  more  courteous,  gentle,  affable  people,  showing  all 
the  evidences  of  good  breeding,  than  the  high  class  of 
Italians,  while  the  lower  strata  ignore  rules  of  civili- 
zation which  raise  mankind  to  a  level  above  the  brute 
creation.  Their  every  day  customs,  which  will  not 
admit  of  any  elaboration  in  these  columns,  fill  tourists 
with  disgust. 


FLORENCE   THE   HOME    OF   ART.  99 

I  shall  omit  the  bloody  portion  of  Florentine  his- 
tory; the  throat  cutting,  assassinations,  the  cruelties, 
the  sieges,  which  made  its  city  walls  necessary,  and 
its  various  experiences  not  unlike  the  other  cities  of 
Italy,  and  will  try  and  eliminate  from  memory  the  un- 
pleasant scenes,  giving  her  credit  for  her  three  li- 
braries containing  300,000  volumes,  her  great  uni- 
versity, her  skill  as  evidenced  in  her  jewelry  marts, 
in  her  mosaics,  the  choicest  in  the  world,  and  in  the 
maintenance  of  the  largest  percentage  of  artists  of 
any  city  of  modern  times. 

I  must  not  omit  the  old  church  containing  the 
tomb  of  Amerigo  Vespucci,  the  publisher  of  the  first 
map  of  the  new  world  and  the  man  who  christened 
our  country  with  the  name  of  America,  nor  the  fa- 
mous Baptistry  with  bronze  doors  which  Michael 
Angelo  said  "were  worthy  to  be  the  Gates  of  Para- 
dise." 

On  account  of  the  intense  heat  we  left  Florence 
on  our  long  ride  to  Rome  at  any  early  hour  in  the 
morning.  The  trip  was  a  repetition  of  previous  ex- 
periences, country  scenes,  furnished  little  that  was 
striking.  Lands  which  had  been  under  cultivation 
for  2,000  years  or  more  still  produce  wheat  and  other 
cereals.  Methods  of  cultivation  are  not  abreast  with 
progressive  countries.  But  few  horses  were  to  be 
seen,  the  beasts  of  burden  were  white  oxen  with  high 
horns  extending  up  nearly  parallel  with  each  other 
from  two  to  three  feet.  All  the  cattle  in  that  section 
of  the  country  are  white,  cows  are  occasionally  seen  in 
the  yoke  and  the  calves  dependent  upon  their  mothers 
for  support  are  keeping  the  drivers  company.  The 


100  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

leading  stock  growers  are  breeding  fine  wool  sheep 
and  goats. 

Wheat  was  being  harvested  with  sickles  and 
cradles,  thrashed  in  the  fields  by  machines  and  the 
grain  scattered  about  on  the  ground  in  heaps.  The 
straw,  which  was  needed  to  enrich  the  land,  was  be- 
ing burned.  If  there  was  any  system,  science  or  good 
sense  in  their  kind  of  farming  it  didn't  show  itself.  It 
was  a  sort  of  hap-hazard,  hit-or-miss  cultivation,  desti- 
tute of  all  signs  of  progressiveness  or  prosperity. 
The  mills  for  grinding  their  grain  were  of  the  most 
primitive  descriptions  and  ancient  patterns. 

The  mass  of  these  tillers  of  the  soil  pay  little  or 
no  regard  to  the  Sabbath,  working  in  the  fields  seven 
days  in  the  week.  As  we  approached  Rome  there 
was  a  decrease  in  the  fertility  of  the  soil  and  the  blight 
upon  the  country  became  more  noticeable.  For  the 
last  fifty  miles  olive  raising  is  the  leading  vocation, 
and  the  numerous  olive  orchards  were  to  us  full  of 
interest.  On  nearly  every  promontory,  or  high  ele- 
vation within  sight  of  our  train  for  a  long  distance 
out  of  Rome,  there  was  a  village  or  city  deserted  and 
in  ruins.  The  castles,  the  public  buildings,  and  the 
residences  all  built  of  stone,  all  dilapidated,  tumbling 
down  and  going  to  decay  were  solemn  reminders  of 
the  history  of  the  mighty  fallen. 


THE  ETERNAL  CITY 


THREE  HOMES— ANCIENT  RUINS— THE  CORSO— STREET  SCENES— 
THE  TIBER. 


Arriving  at  Rome  at  high  noon  imagine  our  sur- 
prise at  finding  a  city  apparently  in  all  respects  mod- 
ern. Fine  hotels,  elegant  residences,  and  homelike 
cottages  with  well  kept  gardens,  and  a  profusion  of 
flowers,  dispelled  the  dreams  of  the  ancient,  dilapi- 
dated, gray  old  Rome,  the  history  of  which  made 
boyhood  impressions  never  to  be  effaced.  This  mod- 
ernized appearance  was  short  lived.  Our  ride  to  the 
center  of  the  city,  which  landed  us  at  the  Hotel  de 
Rome,  located  on  the  Corso,  restored,  or  brought 
out  the  Rome  that  we  were  seeking,  and  that  we  had 
traveled  many  thousand  miles  to  see. 

The  eternal  city  is  composed  of  three  Romes,  the 
modernized  portion,  which  has  come  into  existence 
during  the  last  century,  the  Rome  of  the  middle  ages, 
embracing  the  capitol,  every  phase  of  architecture 
known  to  the  world,  and  public  buildings  of  all 
descriptions,  nearly  all  in  a  fair  state  of  preserva- 
tion, and  the  Rome  of  the  Caesars  generally  in 
ruins  with  here  and  there  relics  of  ancient  days. 
A  few  buildings  still  occupied  that  were  erected  be- 
fore the  Christian  era  and  fragments  of  palaces  and 
the  most  expensive  and  extravagant  residences  ex- 
hibit here  and  there  relics.  It  is  in  Caesar's  Rome 
that  interest  of  the  tourist  deepens.  It  is  there  that 
territory  extending  as  far  as  the  eye  can  reach  pre- 

101 


102  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

sents  scenes  of  desolation  and  annihilation.  Miles 
and  miles  of  debris  is  all  that  is  left  of  a  once  mighty, 
powerful  and  prosperous  city. 

All  the  world  has  read  of  the  Corso  a  mile  long, 
and  the  principal  thoroughfare.  Our  dream  of  the 
street,  comparing  in  width  with  the  leading  streets 
of  Philadelphia  or  the  thoroughfares  of  Salt  Lake 
City — 150  feet  in  width — lacked  reality  when  we 
found  by  actual  measurement  that  the  renowned  old 
Corso  was  less  than  thirty-five  feet  wide,  including  the 
sidewalks,  barely  two  feet  each  in  width.  As  nearly  all 
the  buildings  are  from  five  to  six  stories,  having  bal- 
conies, as  a  rule  the  direct  rays  of  Old  Sol  for  a  good 
part  of  the  day  are  not  to  be  reckoned  with.  Speak- 
ing of  the  sunshine  and  its  effects,  the  popular  idea  is 
that  the  heated  season  of  July  and  August  is  produc- 
tive of  fevers,  and  that  going  to  Rome  during  those 
months  is  a  dangerous  proposition ;  this  is  a  mistaken 
notion,  residents  of  the  city  remain  indoors  during  the 
middle  of  the  day,  and  tourists  following  their  ex- 
ample, or  protecting  themselves  with  umbrellas,  and 
taking  only  moderate  exercise  have  little  to  fear  in  the 
way  of  fevers  or  epidemics.  The  heat  of  the  day  in 
Rome  is  not  without  a  wholesome  atmosphere  coming 
in  from  the  Mediterranean  a  few  miles  away,  while  the 
nights  are  invariably  cool.  From  9  a.  m.  to  4  p.  m. 
the  Corso  is  practically  deserted,  scarcely  a  team  in 
sight.  Both  morning  and  evening  this  thorough- 
fare is  the  liveliest  spot  imaginable.  Progress  is 
necessarily  slow  as  the  loaded  teams  and  carriages 
must  keep  in  line,  going  down  one  side  of  the  street 
and  up  the  other. 


THE    ETERNAL    CITY.  103 

The  present  population  of  Rome  is  claimed  to  be 
500,000,  which  seems  nearer  the  truth  than  figures 
usually  handed  out  by  the  Romans,  as  436,000  rep- 
resented the  last  census.  No  other  surviving  city  has 
a  history  showing  such  extremes  of  prosperity  and 
adversity.  In  her  palmy  and  powerful  days  the  eter- 
nal city  was  by  different  historians  credited  with  from 
2,000,000  to  3,500,000  inhabitants;  this  included  the 
patricians,  plebians  and  the  slaves  which  were  num- 
bered by  hundreds  of  thousands.  When  the  mini- 
mum was  reached  after  her  collapse  she  numbered 
but  17,000  souls.  It  required  many  centuries  to  carry 
the  great  city  down  to  the  borders  of  annihilation. 
The  causes  leading  to  this  depopulation  were  numer- 
ous and  potent.  Roman  history  is  too  familiar  to 
American  readers  to  make  it  necessary  to  enumerate 
and  elaborate  these  causes.  While  the  Roman  em- 
pire was  all  powerful  and  easily  ruled  the  world  and 
the  arts,  sciences  and  literature  reached  the  highest 
planes  of  perfection  ever  attained  before  or  since,  the 
wickedness,  the  heartlessness,  the  cruelty  and  the 
blood-thirstiness  of  its  people  is  without  precedent 
among  civilized  nations.  Christians  were  slaughtered 
by  thousands  in  the  early  centuries,  ostensibly  to  ap- 
pease the  wrath  of  the  infernal  gods.  These  people 
not  only  worshipped  the  imaginary  gods,  but  they 
worshipped  their  emperors  and  men  highest  in  au- 
thority. The  followers  of  the  Nazarine  were  com- 
pelled to  flee  to  the  catacombs  for  safety,  and  when 
captured  were  subjected  to  death  by  inhuman  tor- 
ture. As  an  object  lesson  to  be  studied  by  other  na- 
tions past,  present  and  future,  Roman  history  has  no 
parallel. 


104  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

From  Romulus  to  the  fall  of  the  Roman  empire, 
or  for  nearly  two  thousand  years,  among  the  leading 
attributes  of  the  Romans  was  a  burning  ambition  to 
rule ;  a  despotic  use  of  power,  a  low  appraisement  of 
human  life,  a  merciless,  and  inhuman  warfare  waged 
ceaselessly  upon  nations  that  were  weaker,  conquest 
and  plunder  being  the  main  object. 

For  several  centuries  their  increase  of  wealth  by 
conquest  was  marvelous;  from  the  Orient  came  gold 
almost  without  limit,  also  building  materials  of  the 
most  precious  varieties,  including  porphyry  and  ala- 
baster. This  raw  material,  which  was  fashioned  by 
skilled  workmen,  much  of  which  is  still  to  be  seen 
in  the  city,  conveys  to  the  sightseer  by  its  luster  and 
glitter  a  broad  hint  of  the  brilliancy  and  splendor  of 
the  city  in  the  early  centuries. 

We  took  a  long  ride  out  the  Appian  way,  the 
great  public  thoroughfare  leading  from  the  city,  over 
which  the  spoils  and  prisoners  of  war  entered  the 
metropolis.  This  historical  street  is  well  paved  with 
stone  nearly,  or  quite,  as  hard  as  flint,  has  high  walls 
on  each  side  that  showed  all  the  evidences  of  an- 
tiquity and  importance  as  a  thoroughfare  in  its  time. 
Great  trees  have  grown  on  the  top  of  its  walls,  the 
street  is  no  longer  reinforced  with  palaces  and  richly 
ornamented  homes,  but  instead  are  to  be  seen  by 
thousands  the  mounds  of  debris  already  referred  to. 

Public  improvements  by  this  progressive  people 
were  not  confined  to  public  buildings,  the  necessities 
and  luxuries  of  the  populace  seem  to  have  been  amply 
provided  for,  parks  with  a  capacity  sufficient  for  ac- 
commodating at  once  the  entire  population  of  the 


THE    ETERNAL   CITY.  105 

city  were  tastefully  laid  out  and  scrupulously  cared 
for.  Bathing  facilities  which  would  accommodate 
6,000  people  at  once,  and  water  from  the  Sabine  hills 
forty  miles  away,  of  fine  quality  and  an  amount  suffi- 
cient to  supply  every  need  of  man  and  beast;  por- 
tions of  the  old  aqueduct  used  to  convey  this  water 
are  still  to  be  seen  supported  on  pillars  thirty  feet 
high.  Some  of  the  highly  ornamented  water  reser- 
voirs still  have  a  place  in  the  middle  of  many  of  the 
leading  streets  and  are  supplying  the  thirst  of  the 
horses  and  donkeys. 

The  Tiber  dividing  the  city,  so  conspicuous  in  the 
early  annals  and  for  a  long  period  playing  an  im- 
portant part  in  the  chronicles  and  traditions  of  an- 
cient Rome,  is  encased  in  retaining  walls  perhaps 
thirty  feet  high,  and  has  a  width  approximating  200 
feet,  possibly  more.  The  water  has  a  yellowish  tinge, 
and  like  the  water  of  the  Arno  seemed  to  have  been 
in  contact  with  some  ploughed  land.  Several  fine 
bridges  over  the  Tiber  now  connect  the  ancient  and 
modern  cities. 

Our  guide  pointed  out  the  spot  where  the  heroic 
Horatius  so  valiantly  in  the  brave  days  of  old  with 
two  others,  each  with  broad-swords,  kept  back  the 
forces  of  Lars  Porsena,  while  the  Romans  hewed 
down  the  only  bridge  that  spanned  the  Tiber,  cutting 
off  the  opportunity  for  this  formidable  army  to  enter 
the  ancient  city.  Macaulay's  account  of  this  great 
feat,  of  the  chivalry  of  Horatius,  his  escape  through 
her  river  when  at  flood  tide  and  the  reward  bestowed 
upon  him  by  the  Romans,  was  vividly  recalled.  Ho- 
ratius not  only  hewed  down  the  bridge,  but  in  its 


106  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

defense  there  were  scores  of  Etruria's  noblest  sons, 
under  the  well-aimed  blows  sank  to  rise  no  more ;  as 
a  reward  Macauley  says : 

"They  gave  him  of  the  corn-land, 
That  was  of  public  right 
As  much  as  two  strong  oxen 
Could  plough  from  morn  till  night, 
And  they  made  a  molten  image, 
And  set  it  up  on  high, 
And  there  it  stands  unto  this  day 
To  witness  if  I  lie." 

Some  of  the  street  scenes  of  Rome  are  peculiar  if 
not  unique.  The  white  oxen  with  high  horns  drawing 
huge  old  carts  (which  Hannibal  or  Caesar  would  have 
hardly  considered  up-to-date)  along  the  principal 
thoroughfares  guided  by  barefooted  drivers;  the 
little  starved  donkeys  overloaded  beyond  endurance. 
Women  with  faces  brown  as  Indians  sitting  on  the 
walks  under  the  sun's  direct  rays,  knitting  or  sewing 
and  patiently  waiting  for  customers  for  their  little 
stock  of  pears  or  tomatoes;  with  beggars  by  multi- 
tudes from  the  ancient  Santa  Claus  type  down  to  the 
supple  youth.  These  flexible  boys  by  a  series  oi 
somersaults  keeping  pace  with  your  carriage,  man- 
age to  attract  attention  and  extract  their  full  share 
of  pennies  from  the  pockets  of  tourists.  Their  feats 
are  made  while  wearing  but  a  single  garment,  and 
their  endurance  is  astonishing. 

The  terror  of  the  street  is  the  irrepressible  peddler 
pushing  his  cartload  of  fruit  and  vegetables  and  giv- 
ing Italian  emphasis  and  impressiveness  to  a  medley 
of  screeches  sufficient  to  make  the  welkin  ring;  his 


THE   ETERNAL   CITY.  107 

voice  does  not  seem  to  be  regulated  by  ordinance,  his 
mouth  opens  with  the  wings  of  the  morning,  and  at 
break  of  day  it  may  be  heard  echoing  through  the 
streets  and  alleys. 

The  business  places  are  unlike  anything  found  in 
this  country.  They  are  usually  low,  dark  and  gloomy, 
the  sidewalk  is  often  included  with  the  store  by  a 
canvas  stretched  from  the  outer  edge  of  the  walk. 

Like  all  Latin  cities  Rome  carries  an  immense 
stock  of  goods  intended  for  her  visitors.  Making 
offers  usually  means  a  purchase. 

The  obsequious  cab-drivers  are  never  caught 
without  a  full  stock  of  cheek  or  gall.  They  remind 
one  of  the  "cabbies"  of  Niagara  Falls ;  their  vehicles 
are  usually  old,  out-of-date  affairs,  while  their  horses 
are  the  poorest  to  be  found  in  Europe.  The  plebians 
of  Rome  have  comparatively  few  chances  to  earn 
money,  and  their  primitive  customs  and  styles  of  liv- 
ing are  forcible  evidences  of  their  poverty. 


OBSEQUIES  OF  THE  DEAD  KING 


THE   PANTHEON— THE    COLISEUM— THE   FORUM— ST.    PAUL'S   AND 
ST.  PETER'S  CATHEDRALS— ROME,  THE  TOURIST'S  CLIMAX. 


The  pomp  and  ceremony  observed  at  the  obse- 
quies of  the  late  King  Humbert  for  splendor  and  size 
was  on  a  scale  rarely  if  ever  eclipsed.  It  required 
two  hours  and  twenty-five  minutes  for  the  procession 
to  pass  our  window.  The  pageant  consisted  of  the 
officers  of  the  army,  the  law  making  power  and  heads 
of  all  the  departments  of  Italy  and  the  leading  secret 
orders,  cardinals,  bishops,  monks  and  priests  by 
scores.  This  grand  procession  consisted  mainly  of 
men  above  medium  height,  of  fine  form  and  equipped 
with  appropriate  insignia.  Such  an  exhibition  is  rare- 
ly witnessed  by  an  American.  The  hundreds  of  cav- 
alry horses,  ten  abreast,  gaily  equipped,  and  a  long 
line  of  carriages  loaded  with  flowers  of  the  choicest  va- 
rieties made  a  display  never  to  be  forgotten.  The 
remains  of  the  king  were  followed,  first  by  his  saddle 
horse,  a  bright  bay,  second  by  his  son,  Victor  Em- 
manuel, the  present  king,  on  foot  and  unattended, 
third,  by  Queen  Margarita,  and  the  present  queen  in 
carriages. 

The  multitudes  of  people  that  were  prevented  by 
policemen's  clubs  from  completely  blocking  the 
streets  had  a  generous  sprinkling  of  anarchists,  and 
there  were  several  attempts  made  to  create  riot  by 
cries  of  "Down  with  the  King,"  which  was  only  pre- 
vented by  the  presence  of  the  soldiers.  People  were 

108 


OBSEQUIES   OF   THE   DEAD    KING.  109 

knocked  down  and  trampled  upon,  and  those  injured 
and  sent  to  hospitals  numbered  forty-six.  The  law 
which  compelled  the  king  to  walk  unattended  is  sup- 
posed to  test  his  courage,  and  his  refusal  to  take  the 
risk  would  have  branded  him  as  a  coward.  There 
was  a  notable  absence  of  sorrow  in  the  faces  of  the 
Italians  composing  this  grand  spectacle.  If  vain 
glory  and  ostentation  were  aimed  at  results  were  not 
left  in  doubt.  The  evidences  of  mourning  every- 
where present  in  the  processions  which  followed  the 
remains  of  our  lamented  Lincoln  and  Garfield  did  not 
materialize. 

King  Humbert's  remains  found  a  resting  place  in 
the  Pantheon,  one  of  the  oldest  structures  in  Rome. 
It  was  erected  twenty-seven  years  B.  C,  is  circular  in 
form,  143  feet  across,  and  fairly  well  preserved.  The 
Pantheon  was  built  by  Agrippa  as  a  temple  for  the 
worship  of  the  heathen  gods.  It  came  into  possession 
of  the  Roman  Catholics  in  the  sixth  century,  since 
which  it  has  been  used  as  a  sepulcher  for  members  of 
the  royal  family  and  a  few  others. 

It  is  but  a  short  distance  from  the  Pantheon  to  the 
Coliseum,  the  most  famous  landmark  of  Roman  deso- 
lation. It  is  the  king  of  ruins.  More  than  1,000  years 
ago  its  destruction  begun.  From  its  walls  have  been 
built  basilicas,  blocks  and  residences,  but  enough  re- 
mains of  the  mournful  structure  to  confirm  the  devil- 
ish records  of  its  bloodiest  monuments.  The  Coli- 
seum covers  five  acres  of  ground,  and  when  com- 
pleted had  a  seating  capacity  of  87,000  people,  and 
on  state  occasions  when  an  unusual  number  of  Chris- 
tians were  to  be  slaughtered  100,000  found  room  with- 


110  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

in  its  walls.  It  was  built  in  the  first  century,  and  the 
brick,  cement,  stone  and  marble  used  had  all  the  en- 
durance and  resistance  of  the  best  materials  the  world 
has  ever  known.  From  the  outer  to  the  inner  walls 
there  are  five  arches.  It  was  157  feet  high,  and  the 
brick  used  in  its  construction  show  few  signs  of  decay 
or  deterioration,  where  in  the  least  protected  from 
the  weather.  The  marble  and  iron  clamps  long  ago 
disappeared,  and  inch  by  inch  the  most  exposed  por- 
tions have  succumbed  to  the  great  leveler  time.  Its 
walls,  arches  and  arena  are  overgrown  with  grass, 
weeds  and  shrubs,  and  an  occasional  tree.  Birds,  but- 
terflies, tree-toads  and  crickets  were  in  possession  of 
the  gigantic  ruin.  During  the  last  century  some  of 
the  walls  have  been  renewed  and  the  wholesale  de- 
struction of  the  ruin  has  been  arrested.  The  spot 
where  the  Christian  martyrs  suffered  is  marked  by  a 
tall  cross,  and  the  preservation  of  the  Coliseum  is  a 
tribute  to  the  memory  of  the  Christians  who  were 
sacrificed  within  its  walls.  The  arena  in  the  center  of 
the  amphitheatre,  where  11,000  lives  went  out  in  a 
single  year,  the  subterranean  passages  which  admitted 
to  the  arena  wild  beasts  from  Palatine  hill  are  well 
preserved.  Enough  of  the  ruin  remains  to  give  em- 
phasis and  impressiveness  to  the  annals  and  chronicles 
which  mark  the  Coliseum  as  the  center  of  unmitigated 
persecution,  flagrant  cruelty  and  heartless,  cold- 
blooded sacrifice  of  innocent  life.  The  blood  of  Chris- 
tians drenched  the  earth  within  this  enclosure,  and 
their  slaughter  was  the  occasion  for  holidays  of  the 
blood-thirsty  Romans.  It  was  under  Titus  christened 
by  the  slaughter  of  5,000  wild  beasts.  Conceived  in 


OBSEQUIES   OF   THE   DEAD   KING.  Ill 

sin  and  brought  forth  in  iniquity  this  ancient  struc- 
ture will  long  remain  a  monument  to  the  folly  of  the 
Romans.  The  Coliseum  occupies  a  portion  of  the 
low  ground  previously  used  by  Nero  in  the  construc- 
tion of  his  golden  house  or  palace,  the  wonders  of 
which  for  magnificence  had  never  been  equaled  in 
Europe.  It  was  built  soon  after  the  great  fire  of 
A.  D.  64,  which  devastated  three-fourths  of  the  city. 
Nero  was  charged  with  causing  the  conflagration  to 
clear  the  ground  which  stretched  from  the  Palatine 
to  the  Esquiline  Hills,  embracing  in  all  1,200  acres. 
Accounts  of  the  splendor  of  this  house  are  almost  in- 
credible. Its  walls  are  said  to  have  blazed  with  gold 
and  precious  stones.  Italy  and  the  provinces  were 
ransacked  for  funds,  and  Asia  was  levied  upon  for  a 
liberal  contribution  to  satisfy  the  rapacity  of  Nero. 
The  grounds,  meadows,  lakes  and  shady  woods  were 
marvelous  for  their  beauty  and  lavish  expenditure. 
Nero  belonged  to  the  line  of  the  Caesars,  and  with 
his  suicide  in  68  ended  his  fourteen  years  reign  and 
a  new  phase  of  Roman  imperialism  was  entered  upon. 
If  Roman  literature  is  to  be  credited  Nero  was  a 
"Monster  of  wickedness."  During  his  first  five  years 
as  emperor  he  won  the  enthusiasm  of  the  multitude, 
and  was  applauded  for  his  modesty  and  correction  of 
many  abuses.  Later  the  "Wild  beast"  in  his  nature 
developed  and  without  restraint  or  conscience  he  en- 
tered upon  a  life  of  recklessness  and  debauchery  never 
equalled.  His  series  of  crimes  included  the  murder  of 
his  own  mother,  the  kicking  to  death  of  his  own  wife 
and  the  wholesale  murder  of  wealthy  Greeks  for  their 
money.  He  reveled  in  the  blood  of  both  friends  and 


112  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

enemies  when  in  the  heat  of  unbridled  passions. 
Through  fear  of  assassination  at  the  age  of  31  years 
he  took  himself  off.  Fortunately  his  career  of  fan- 
tastic revelry,  frightful  disasters  and  "incarnation  of 
splendid  iniquity"  had  an  early  termination. 

The  most  fascinating  spot  in  the  eternal  city  is 
the  Forum,  embracing  thirty-five  acres  of  devastation 
and  ruin.  Rome  for  many  centuries  sat  on  her  seven 
hills  and  ruled  the  world.  The  strength  of  the  great 
Roman  empire  centered  at  the  Forum.  It  was  there 
that  the  law  makers  legislated,  that  the  heads  of  gov- 
ernment congregated,  that  the  wisdom  of  statesmen 
was  proclaimed,  that  the  eloquence  of  orators  and  the 
charm  of  words  swayed  the  multitudes ;  it  was  there 
that  the  most  radical  measures  were  enacted,  and 
profligate  uses  of  power  were  indulged  in;  it  was 
there  that  caprice,  intrigue  and  conspiracy  originated ; 
it  was  there  that  envy  was  nourished  and  suspicion, 
rivalry  and  jealousy  ripened  into  assassination.  Not- 
withstanding its  present  desolation  this  ancient  spot 
has  a  fascination  that  is  irresistible;  our  guide  pointed 
out  the  location  of  the  great  law  making  power  of  the 
Roman  senate  where  the  most  classical  and  learned  of 
Roman  scholars  and  statesmen  discussed  the  perti- 
nent issues  of  two  thousand  years  ago.  Here  were 
located  temples  and  basilicas,  a  few  columns  of  which 
still  stand ;  the  temple  of  Vesta,  where  the  vestal  fires 
were  kept  burning  for  many  centuries,  was  located  by 
a  few  fragments  of  architectural  beauty.  Some  rem- 
nants of  the  gorgeous  house  of  Pompey  still  remain ; 
the  spot  where  Caesar  was  assassinated  and  where 
the  political  trimmer  Mark  Antony  delivered  the  ora- 


OBSEQUIES   OF  THE   DEAD   KING.  113 

tion  over  his  dead  body  were  pointed  out;  also  the 
place  where  Caesar's  body  was  cremated  by  the  furi- 
ous conspirators  and  where  Cicero  thrilled  great  audi- 
ences with  his  eloquence.  These  hallowed  places  are 
deeply  buried  under  an  accumulation  of  debris  on 
the  surface  of  which  I  picked  some  roses  and  some, 
to  me,  nameless  wild  flowers.  A  force  of  laborers 
were  employed  in  excavating  the  great  heaps  of 
debris,  and  the  week  we  were  there  they  were  re- 
warded by  unearthing  a  spring  which,  through  its 
round,  well-preserved  marble  curb,  supplied  the  vestal 
virgins  with  pure  water. 

A  more  prolific  field  for  human  imagination  can- 
not be  conceived.  To  stand  where  Caesar  stood,  by 
far  the  greatest  of  all  the  great  men  of  his  time,  and 
to  trace  the  growth  of  his  power  and  influence,  which 
became  supreme,  and  the  wicked  conspiracy  ending 
in  his  murder  because  he  was  ambitious,  and  to  con- 
nect all  this  with  one's  surroundings  is  a  rare  exhi- 
laration. It  was  in  that  historic  locality  that  the 
climax  of  interest  was  reached  by  our  party. 

There  are  more  than  three  hundred  churches  in 
Rome,  including  the  cathedrals;  they  are  nearly  all 
Roman  Catholic,  and  the  splendor  displayed  in  a 
few  cannot  be  conveyed  to  the  reader  by  cheap  words. 
St.  Paul's  something  more  than  a  mile  out  of  the 
city,  erected  on  the  ground  where  St.  Paul  is  said  to 
have  been  buried,  is  an  easy  rival  of  the  most  elegant 
cathedrals  of  the  world ;  it  has  lavish  interior  decora- 
tions ;  it  was  founded  in  the  third  century,  burned  in 
the  eighteenth  century  and  re-opened  in  1854.  It  is 
over  four  hundred  feet  in  length,  has  eighty  tall,  well- 


114  GLIMPSES   OF  EUROPE. 

polished  granite  columns  each  cut  from  a  single  block, 
and  on  its  walls  has  two  hundred  and  fifty-two  me- 
dallion mosaic  portraits  of  the  popes,  and  we  doubt 
whether  such  an  aggregation  of  fine  faces  can  be 
found  in  any  other  of  the  world's  collections.  St. 
Peter's  is  known  as  the  largest  and  most  costly  edifice 
in  the  world.  It  was  350  years  in  building,  at  a  cost 
of  $50,000,000,  is  651  feet  in  length,  429  in  breadth 
at  transept,  has  748  columns,  46  altars  and  100  statues. 
The  tomb  of  St.  Peter  is  underneath  its  dome,  and 
within  its  walls  may  be  located  by  their  sepulchre  and 
elegant  monuments  many  of  the  popes  that  long  since 
passed  away.  Polished  marbles,  gilded  stuccos  and 
grand  mosaics  lead  in  its  ornamentation;  to  fully 
comprehend  its  capacity  or  immensity  requires  time. 
It  affords  standing  room  for  more  than  ten  thousand 
people,  and  1,200  lights  are  kept  constantly  burning. 
From  the  floor  to  the  top  of  the  dome  inside  is  435 
feet.  St.  Peter's  was  designed  by  Michael  Angelo, 
but  after  his  death  his  plans  were  changed,  and  in 
spite  of  all  its  glitter  its  architecture  is  conceded  to 
be  a  dismal  failure. 

The  Vatican  is  one  of  the  principal  attractions  of 
Rome;  it  consists  of  the  palace  or  residence  of  the 
pope,  contains  the  great  library,  the  museums,  art 
collection,  ancient  and  modern,  and  is  claimed  to 
consist  of  11,000  rooms.  This  number  is,  however, 
a  bare-faced  exaggeration.  If  the  plain  truth  were 
told  it  would  stand  without  a  rival  as  to  number  of 
rooms  and  as  the  most  immense  collection  known  of 
paintings,  statuary,  bronzes,  medals,  vases  and  all 
other  varieties  of  art.  Many  of  the  rooms  are  dec- 


OBSEQUIES   OF   THE   DEAD   KING.  115 

orated  with  frescoes  from  the  pencil  of  Michael  An- 
gelo.  The  library  is  magnificent.  In  the  art  depart- 
ment may  be  found  many  of  the  masterpieces  of 
Michael  Angelo,  Raphael  and  other  masters  of  their 
time.  Any  attempt  to  give  a  list  even  of  the  most 
notable  pieces  of  sculpture,  or  the  most  renowned 
paintings,  would  be  tiresome  to  both  the  writer  and 
the  reader.  We  were  dazed  with  the  splendor  of  the 
Vatican  and  confused  with  the  marvelous  number  of 
its  rooms  and  their  interesting  contents. 

The  palace  of  the  Pope  has  nothing  striking  in  its 
outward  appearance.  It  being  the  week  of  the  obse- 
quies of  King  Humbert  no  strangers  were  admitted 
to  the  presence  of  Pope  Leo.  The  bodyguard  of  the 
Pope — all  Switzers — would  by  their  presence  grace 
the  highest  court  in  the  world. 

It  is  said  that  the  Pope  does  not  dare  to  trust 
his  life  in  the  hands  of  the  Italian  soldiery,  and  Switz- 
erland has  the  honor  of  furnishing  the  choicest  of  her 
young  blood. 

A  short  tramp  in  the  catacombs  satisfied  the  writer 
that  these  subterranean  channels  were  never  intended 
for  residence  purposes.  They  are  said  to  be  600  miles 
in  extent,  and  we  took  their  word  for  it.  The  faint 
light  of  our  candle  failed  to  reveal  anything  startling. 
There  were  many  niches  in  the  rocks  where  the  bodies 
of  dead  Christians  had  been  laid  to  rest,  but  they  have 
all  been  removed  to  the  surface  and  given  a  Christian 
burial.  It  is  difficult  to  account  for  the  extent  of  the 
catacombs,  and  the  theory  that  the  rock  taken  out 
when  ground  made  a  superior  quality  of  cement, 


116  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

which   was   used   for  building   purposes  in  ancient 
Rome,  seems  the  most  plausible. 

Recollections  of  Rome  will  return  in  later  years 
a  connecting  link  in  the  chain  which  binds  together 
twenty-eight  centuries.  Its  treasures,  its  cathedrals, 
its  basilicas,  its  antique  churches,  its  mosaics,  its  por- 
phyry, frescoes  and  remnants  of  spectral  beauty,  and 
above  all  its  ruins,  many  of  which  are  saturated  with 
crude  condemnations,  to  the  pilgrims  who  make  them 
a  study  are  a  fruitful  field ;  although  their  destruction 
saddens,  what  is  left  grows  upon  the  sight-seer  and  the 
student.  Hearts  are  softened  by  the  absence  as  well 
as  the  presence  of  the  creations  and  handiwork  of  a 
race  of  geniuses. 


PISA  AND  ITS  ANCIENT  LANDMARKS 


LEANING  TOWER— GALILEO'S  PENDULUM— ALLURING  GENOA— ITS 
CASTLES  AND  PALACES. 


A  long,  monotonous  ride  from  Rome  to  Pisa 
reaching  into  the  night  made  one  of  the  unpleasant 
features  of  our  trip.  Italian  heat  of  mid-summer  and 
a  train  of  Italian  carriages  making  gravel  train  pro- 
gress over  one  of  the  roughest  roads  on  the  conti- 
nent, produced  anything  but  amiability.  We  were 
late  for  dinner  and  some  of  our  party,  unable  to  find 
a  restaurant,  went  to  bed  hungry. 

Pisa,  a  city  of  about  25,000  inhabitants  is  very,  very 
old,  shrunken  from  a  population  of  400,000  in  the 
zenith  of  her  glory.  No  reliable  account  is  given  of 
its  origin.  For  a  long  period  during  the  height  of 
Rome's  prosperity  Pisa  was  considered  the  second 
city  in  Italy  as  regards  size  and  power.  She  belongs 
in  the  sphere  of  mythology.  Recent  discoveries  in 
the  excavation  of  old  ruins,  place  Pisa  in  the  list  of 
prehistoric  cities,  upsetting  previous  calculations. 

Pisa  has  shared  in  the  ups  and  downs  of  prosper- 
ity and  misery.  At  one  time  she  quarreled  with  her 
sister  city,  Genoa,  and  went  to  war.  Four  hundred 
ships  were  fitted  out,  manned  and  entered  the  fray. 
Pisa  got  thrashed  and  never  recovered  from  the 
shock;  both  before  and  after  this  defeat,  she  was  at 
war  with  the  semi-barbarious  Huns,  her  forces  were 
slaughtered  and  her  property  destroyed. 

117 


118  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

The  history  of  Pisa  is  a  repetition  of  the  old  Ital- 
ian story,  saturated  with  barbarity  and  cruelty. 

The  city  is  located  in  the  midst  of  a  rich,  fertile 
country,  generally  low,  with  a  tendency  to  being 
swampy.  The  soil  is  well  cultivated  and  planted  with 
lupines  and  olives.  Its  surroundings  as  far  as  the  eye 
could  reach,  from  the  top  of  its  leaning  tower,  re- 
sembles a  well-kept  garden,  corn,  and  grapes  for  wine 
purposes  are  grown  in  abundance. 

The  peasants  are  better  clothed  and  apparently 
better  nourished  than  in  most  parts  of  Italy. 

The  city  has  the  form  of  a  square  and  is  situated 
about  thirty  feet  above  sea  level,  lying  along  both 
banks  of  the  Arno,  which  empties  into  the  Mediter- 
ranean about  six  miles  below.  The  two  halves 
of  the  town  are  connected  by  four  bridges.  The 
old  town  is  surrounded  by  a  high  wall  surmount- 
ed with  battlements  and  gateways,  which  can  be 
entered  by  several  different  routes.  The  Arno  is  digni- 
fied by  high  retaining  walls  on  each  side,  extending 
up  perhaps  four  feet  above  the  street.  This  masonry 
is  heavy,  substantial  and  ornamental.  Fishing  with 
hook  and  line  from  the  top  of  these  walls  seemed  to 
be  the  leading  vocation  of  the  loungers.  They  fished 
without  results  but  kept  up  appearances  nevertheless. 
I  was  reminded  of  the  lines  of  Homer  as  I  watched 
these  ancient  fishermen,  where,  in  speaking  of  Jove 
and  his  fishing  outfit,  he  said : 

"His  pole  was  of  the  sturdy  oak, 
His  line  a  cable  ship's  ne'er  broke, 
His  bait  was  of  the  dragon's  tail, 
And  Jove  sat  there  and  bobbed  for  whale." 


PISA    AND    ITS    ANCIENT    LANDMARKS.       119 

From  the  sluggish  movement  of  these  people 
something  less  than  whale  for  breakfast  would  seem 
adequate  to  their  needs. 

It  is  said  that  the  average  citizen  of  Pisa  is  a 
drowsy,  listless,  stupid  inhabitant,  owing  to  atmos- 
pheric conditions,  that  the  uniform  temperature  of  the 
year  also  contributes  to  the  heavy,  cloggy  inertia, 
which  affects  its  people. 

Pisa  has  one  great  historical  attraction,  it  lean- 
ing tower,  about  one  hundred  and  eighty  feet  high, 
which  is  familiar  to  the  civilized  world.  Why  it 
leans  is  one  of  the  unsolved  mysteries,  that  it  leans 
can  be  seen  from  afar  off.  Its  walls  are  fourteen  feet 
out  of  plumb,  so  that  a  line  suspended  from  the  top 
on  one  side  strikes  the  earth  fourteen  feet  from  the 
base  of  the  tower.  This  marvelous  structure  was 
begun  in  the  eleventh  century  and  was  completed 
about  two  hundred  years  afterward.  It  is  cylindrical 
in  form,  has  a  diameter  of  fifty  feet,  and  a  stairway  of 
three  hundred  and  thirty  steps  leads  to  the  summit. 
The  walls  are  thirteen  feet  thick  at  the  base  and  about 
one-half  as  thick  at  the  top,  and  are  constructed 
throughout  of  marble.  It  is  divided  into  eight  stories, 
each  story  having  an  outside  gallery  seven  feet  in 
width.  The  basement  is  surrounded  by  a  range  of 
semi-circular  arches  supported  by  fifteen  columns,  and 
above  this  are  six  arcades  of  thirty  columns  each. 
The  eighth  story  belfry  is  much  smaller  in  diameter. 
The  tower  derives  its  name  from  its  leaning  propen- 
sity and  appears  to  the  observer  to  be  on  the  point 
of  falling. 

There  is  no  trouble  in  convincing  yourself  to  a 


120  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

mathematical  certainty  that  ascending  the  tower  to 
the  top  is  a  safe  proposition,  but  in  spite  of  this  you 
have  a  spooky,  creepy  feeling  as  you  crawl  over  on 
the  leaning  side  and  peer  down  the  one  hundred  and 
eighty-three  feet,  you  can  hardly  resist  the  conviction 
that  it  is  not  only  going  to  fall,  but  that  it  is  actually 
falling. 

The  best  authorities  of  late  attribute  the  leaning 
of  the  tower  to  a  defect  in  its  foundation.  They  say 
it  was  built  upon  wooden  piles  driven  into  the  boggy 
ground,  and  after  being  carried  up  about  thirty-five 
feet,  it  began  to  settle  to  one  side  and  the  levels  were 
altered  so  as  to  keep  the  center  of  gravity  within  the 
base.  In  our  generation  asylums  are  built  where 
lunatics  are  confined  Avho  would  make  such  a  reckless 
expenditure  of  great  sums  of  money. 

The  seven  bells  in  the  eighth  story,  constructed  of 
the  very  best  metal,  assist  in  holding  the  balance  of 
power  by  a  majority  of  them  being  located  on  the 
strong  side,  or  opposite  the  over-hanging  wall.  The 
heaviest  of  these  bells  weighs  six  tons. 

Near  the  leaning  tower  is  the  cathedral  and  the 
baptistry.  The  cathedral  is  the  oldest  and  the  bap- 
tistry is  made  famous  by  the  fact  that  Galileo  made  a 
discovery  within  its  walls  in  the  fifteenth  century 
which  was  the  beginning  of  a  new  era  in  science. 
Happening  to  observe  the  oscillation  of  a  lamp  casu- 
ally set  in  motion  in  the  cathedral,  Galileo  was  struck 
with  the  apparent  measured  regularity  of  its  vibration, 
and  having  compared  these  vibrations  with  the  beat 
of  his  own  pulse,  he  concluded  that  by  means  of  this 
regularity  of  oscillation  a  simple  pendulum  might  be 


PISA    AND    ITS    ANCIENT    LANDMARKS.       121 

made  valuable  for  the  exact  measurement  of  time. 
He  applied  his  discovery  to  the  construction  of  a 
clock  for  astronomical  purposes. 

Galileo  was  but  eighteen  years  of  age  when  mak- 
ing this  discovery  and  was  tortured  on  account  of  it. 
He  lived  to  be  seventy-eight,  but  probably  passed 
away  without  a  full  comprehension  of  the  value  of  his 
invention.  The  multitude  of  dollar  clocks  and  brass 
watches  twenty-three  carats  fine  came  too  late  to 
haunt  the  dreams  of  this  great  public  benefactor. 

Pisa  is  not  without  architecture.  Her  old  public 
edifices  reflect  the  genius  of  the  ancients,  and  as  a 
home  of  art  the  city  is  abreast  of  other  ancient  land- 
marks of  like  population. 

There  is  a  long  list  of  jaw-breaking  Italian  names 
connected  with  the  best  samples  of  her  paintings  and 
sculpture;  some  of  them  are  familiar,  but  the  list  of 
new  ones  is  confusing.  Even  Michael  Angelo  is  rep- 
resented or  credited  with  some  of  the  masterpieces. 
Michael  Angelo  was  a  great  artist,  a  great  man,  and 
lived  to  a  good  old  age.  That  he  could  get  through 
with  all  the  work  credited  to  him  in  an  ordinary  life- 
time seems  out  of  the  question.  Had  Methuselah 
been  an  artist  and  were  he  honored  with  all  the  paint- 
ings, sculpture  and  architecture  standing  to  the  credit 
of  Michael  Angelo  he  would  not  have  earned  the  rep- 
utation of  being  an  idler,  and  would  seem  to  have  been 
a  very  busy  man. 

Pisa  boasts  of  one  of  the  best  universities  in  Italy. 
The  Campo  Santo,  the  principal  cemetery,  lying  north 
of  the  cathedral,  was  long  ago  made  sacred  in  the 


122  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

estimate  of  the  Pisans  by  the  importation  of  fifty-three 
ship  loads  of  earth  from  Mount  Calvary  in  which 
the  tombs  are  set. 

The  leaning  tower,  the  cathedral,  the  baptistry 
and  a  few  other  points  occupied  the  forenoon,  when 
we  resumed  our  winding  way  along  the  shore  of  the 
Mediterranean  to  Genoa. 

The  Mediterranean  sparkling  in  the  sunlight 
reaching  from  Gibraltar  to  Jerusalem  (2,100  miles), 
and  across  to  the  northern  shore  of  Africa,  was  a  sub- 
ject for  reflection.  Could  its  waters  speak,  the  tales 
of  conquest,  of  piracy,  of  naval  combats,,  ignominious 
defeats  and  brilliant  achievements  covering  twenty- 
five  centuries,  an  interesting  history  would  be  re- 
vealed. 

Between  Pisa  and  Genoa  there  are  tunnels  and 
tunnels,  dark,  damp  and  dirty.  Genoa,  a  city  by  the 
sea,  which  in  an  early  day  earned  the  title  of  "Superb" 
has  about  150,000  inhabitants,  mostly  engaged  in 
commercial  and  maritime  pursuits.  The  city  does  a 
thriving  business  in  the  line  of  exports  and  imports. 

Genoa  is  unique  in  its  construction,  the  city  is 
upon  edge,  has  a  very  moderate  amount  of  land  that 
may  be  termed  level. 

The  narrow  belt  along  the  coast  is  densely  popu- 
lated and  for  quite  a  distance  up  the  side  of  the  moun- 
tain is  thickly  settled,  but  above,  along  the  mountain 
side,  in  the  far  distance  are  to  be  seen  palaces, 
churches,  elegant  residences  occupied  by  the  elite, 
many  of  which  are  limited  to  a  niche  in  the  hill  side, 
while  others  occupy  an  artificial  terrace. 

The  streets  leading  to  or  through  that  portion  of 


PISA    AND    ITS    ANCIENT    LANDMARKS.       123 

the  city  are  hardly  worthy  of  the  name,  many  of  them 
are  simply  paths,  too  steep  for  a  vehicle  of  any  sort. 
Some  of  the  wealthy  residents  are  carried  in  chairs 
to  and  from  their  homes,  while  others  depend  upon 
the  back  of  a  donkey  for  transportation.  This  picture 
along  the  native  walls  of  the  Apennines,  representing 
the  highest  plane  of  architecture,  was  an  enchanting 
one.  Olive  and  orange  orchards,  and  pomegranate 
trees,  ornamental  shrubbery  and  rare  flowers  added 
to  the  picture.  Genoa  has  her  smart  set,  her  women 
are  stylish  and  many  of  them  beautiful.  In  her  social 
functions  Genoa  excels  all  other  Italian  cities. 

She  has  eighty  churches,  a  hundred  palaces  and 
much  that  is  ancient  and  interesting.  As  everybody 
knows  Genoa  claims  to  be  the  birth  place  of  Colum- 
bus. She  has  two  autograph  letters  on  exhibition 
from  the  hand  of  the  great  discoverer.  The  monu- 
ment to  Columbus  is  a  stupendous  affair  of  elegant 
design. 

An  Italian  city  without  a  wall  would  be  a  curios- 
ity, and  the  walls  of  Genoa  having  eight  gates  consti- 
tuted a  part  of  the  defenses  in  the  brave  days  of  old. 
In  addition  to  these  walls  there  were  numerous  forts 
and  batteries.  But  in  spite  of  these  she  was  soundly 
whipped  and  pillaged  by  the  Saracens  nine  hundred 
years  ago. 

The  Genoese  were  born  fighters  and  ancient  his- 
tory records  struggles  with  their  neighbors  in  war, 
which  we  Americans  call  "civil."  The  Genoese  have 
a  well  established  hobby,  the  evidence  of  which  is 
found  in  the  famous  cemeteries.  Probably  no  other 
people  in  the  world  take  as  much  pride  in  their  city 


124  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

of  the  dead;  her  palatial  tombs  and  vast  marble  cor- 
ridors and  exquisite  monuments  abound  in  grace  and 
beauty.  There  is  a  rivalry  which  expenditure  of  cold 
cash  hardly  seems  to  limit.  While  New  Orleans  leads 
in  this  respect  in  America,  Genoa  is  said  to  have  a 
long  lead  in  Europe.  It  was  with  a  sigh  of  regret 
that  we  took  the  last  panoramic  view  of  that  portion 
of  the  Apenines  occupied  by  this  peculiar  city. 


FASCINATIONS  OF  THE  ALPS 


VENERABLE    BALE— NATIVE    LAND    OF    THE    FRENCHMAN— HIS 
PARADISE— DELIGHTFUL  LANDSCAPE. 


From  Genoa  to  Milan,  five  hours,  (miles  never 
in  Europe)  was  much  of  it  picturesque.  The  exten- 
sive marble  quarries  in  the  outskirts  of  Genoa,  which 
contribute  so  largely  to  supplying  the  wants  of  civil- 
ization in  every  quarter  of  the  globe,  was  the  first  and 
only  interest  of  the  kind  seen  in  our  travels.  During 
the  past  century  Vermont  granite  has  made  extensive 
inroads  into  the  demand  for  Italian  marble,  in  other 
words  the  American  demand  for  marble  has  been 
largely  superseded  by  granite  of  superior  quality. 

We  encountered  the  never  failing  tunnels,  we  rode 
along  on  the  edge  of  precipices  and  were  treated  to 
a  panorama  of  fruitful  fields,  vast  orchards  and  rocky 
hillsides. 

At  Milan  we  were  at  home  for  a  night  in  the  Grand 
Hotel,  our  hostelry  pre-empted  on  our  way  to  Rome. 
An  early  morning  review  of  some  of  the  sights  pre- 
viously enjoyed  in  the  interesting  city  of  Milan,  and 
we  were  off  for  Bale  or  Basel,  nine  hours  away. 

Usually  repeating  a  railroad  ride  or  taking  a  back 
track  is  monotonous,  not  so  in  this  case.  Our  trip 
south  through  and  over  the  Alps  by  St.  Gothard's 
Pass  was  made  during  a  rainy  day,  when  the  clouds 
hung  low  and  the  mists  enveloped  some  of  the  highest 
peaks.  Our  return  was  quite  the  contrary.  It  was 
one  of  those  bright,  crisp  days  which  put  men  and 

126 


126  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

- 

mountains  at  their  best,  and  the  views  of  the  snow  clad 
peaks,  the  villas,  the  rude  cottages  and  the  quaint 
little  villages,  were  all  enjoyed  beyond  measure.  The 
scenes  from  those  mountain  tops  are  awfully  grand. 
Word-painting  can  never  do  them  justice.  To  be  ap- 
preciated they  must  be  seen.  Lake  Como  and  Lake 
Lucerne  had  lost  none  of  their  splendor,  while  the 
little  city  of  Lucerne  retained  all  its  former  attractive- 
ness. 

Between  Lucerne  and  Bale  is  a  rich  agricultural 
country,  at  that  time  abounding  in  great  crops  of 
grain,  hay  and  vegetables.  It  is  also  a  fruit  country 
and  the  apple  orchards  were  loaded  with  fruit  of  de- 
sirable quality.  Barring  Zurich,  Bale  is  the  largest 
city  in  Switzerland,  its  population  being  90,000.  It  is 
the  wealthiest  of  all  her  cities  and  its  history  is  an- 
tique. Lying  on  both  sides  of  the  Rhine  it  is  connec- 
ted by  a  bridge  800  feet  in  length.  Its  climate  is 
mild  and  not  subjected  to  the  radical  changes  of  many 
other  parts  of  Europe.  The  population  of  Bale  is 
much  less  than  during  the  middle  ages.  The  city 
has  had  troubles  of  her  own,  thirty  years  of  war  at  one 
stretch  devastated  a  large  portion  of  the  town. 

The  great  reform  movement  of  the  fourteenth  and 
fifteenth  centuries  which  occurred  in  and  around 
Bale,  makes  the  city  conspicuous  in  the  annals  of  his- 
tory. Luther's  writings  were  first  printed  in  Bale 
and  the  reformer's  conflict  with  the  Roman  govern- 
ment occurred  in  this  city,  which  has  since  been  Pro- 
testant. The  fine  old  gothic  cathedral  erected  in  1010 
still  stands,  also  the  church  of  "The  Barefooted 
Friars,"  no  longer  used  as  a  church  but  as  a  store 


FASCINATIONS  OF  THE  ALPS.  127 

house.  A  university,  a  library  containing  120,000  vol- 
umes, and  other  educational  and  religious  landmarks, 
connecting  the  present  with  the  past,  giving  this  old 
Switzer  city  a  flavor  of  richness  and  adoration. 

The  industrial  phases  of  Bale  are  typical  of  the 
thrift  noticeable  in  other  Switzerland  cities.  Two 
million  dollars  worth  of  ribbons  are  annually  manu- 
factured. There  are  also  factories  for  the  manufac- 
ture of  woolens,  linen,  cotton,  leather  and  salt ;  enough 
in  this  line  to  keep  the  people  busy  and  the  wolf  from 
their  doors.  It  was  a  pleasure  to  return  to  an  atmos- 
phere of  prosperity,  to  be  relieved  from  the  appeals 
of  the  puny,  sickly,  saffron-skinned  beggars,  and  the 
sights  of  destitution  and  poverty. 

The  Switzers  of  Bale  all  seem  to  be  well  fed,  well 
clothed  and  happy.  There  were  no  half-starved 
donkeys,  or  broken  down,  abused  horses  in  sight,  in 
fact  there  were  no  horses  in  use  that  would  be  worth 
less  than  $125  to  $150  in  Elyria. 

The  writer  took  a  long  walk  through  the  residence 
portion  of  Bale.  The  residences  are  neither  elegant 
nor  strikingly  attractive,  but  all  seemed  to  be  substan- 
tially built,  and  both  the  residences  and  the  grounds 
in  most  cases  were  protected  with  high  walls  on  the 
top  of  which  were  rods  of  steel  or  iron  with  sharp 
points,  suggesting  protection  against  invasion  of  ene- 
mies from  without  or  within  the  city. 

Our  stay  at  the  Hotel  Switzerhof  was  rewarded 
with  the  usual  German  hospitality.  Although  it  was 
August  and  the  heat  was  oppressive  we  were  expected 
to  sleep  between  two  feather  beds,  and  dumping  the 


128  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

upper  one  in  the  corner  of  the  room  brought  no  im- 
munity from  the  sweltering  propensities  of  the  other. 

The  menu  at  the  Switzerhof  offered  no  variations 
from  the  regular  European  standard.  For  breakfast 
we  had  coffee,  and  rolls  having  a  shell  hard  enough 
to  defy  mastication  by  ordinary  processes,  honey, 
either  fish  or  beef  without  vegetables.  At  noon  we 
lunched  or  shirked  for  ourselves  taking  what  was 
offered  in  the  restaurants  and  for  a  7  o'clock  dinner 
there  was  a  grand  spread  of  nine  to  eleven  courses 
requiring  from  one  and  a  half  to  two  hours  to  com- 
plete the  program.  These  dinners  are  never  prepared 
without  a  draft  upon  the  poultry  yard.  It  is  safe  to 
say  that  no  table  d'hote  dinner  is  ever  spread  in  Eu- 
rope without  chicken.  It  is  not  the  kind  of  chicken 
prepared  by  our  wives  and  mothers  in  America,  but 
usually  the  chicken  which  seemed  to  have  lived  in 
vain,  whose  life  seemed  to  have  been  a  dismal  failure 
owing  to  a  want  of  skill  needed  in  the  kitchen.  I 
offer  no  criticism  upon  the  beef,  the  mutton  and  the 
fish  from  which  we  were  allowed  to  choose,  but  draw 
a  line  upon  the  cooked  European  chicken. 

France  with  204,000  square  miles,  or  five  times 
the  area  of  Ohio,  has  something  more  than  40,000,000 
people,  and  her  colonies  in  Africa  with  the  islands  of 
the  sea,  contain  32,000  square  miles  and  1,500,000 
inhabitants. 

France  is  favored  with  one  of  the  finest  climates 
in  Europe,  although  there  are  variations.  It  is  an 
agricultural  country,  the  best  portions  of  which  are 
not  surpassed  for  fertility. 

The  French  farmers  supply  their  commonwealth 


FASCINATIONS  OF  THE  ALPS.  129 

with  wheat  and  as  a  rule  have  a  surplus  for  export. 
It  is  not  uncommon  for  France  to  produce  300,000,- 
000  bushels,  or  one-half  as  much  as  the  whole  United 
States.  Grape  and  wine  production  lead  all  other 
countries,  but  her  wines  and  brandies  are  mostly  con- 
sumed within  her  own  borders ;  enough  is  exported  to 
America  to  enable  our  importers  to  practice  brazen 
deception  by  the  use  of  foreign  labels. 

The  eastern  portion  of  France  as  seen  from  the 
railroad  was  disappointing;  much  of  the  soil  is  poor 
and  the  peasantry  were  apparently  in  hard  lines ;  the 
residences  are  often  in  groups  and  the  stacks  of  grain 
and  hay  mixed  with  low  sheds  made  a  unique  combi- 
nation. These  houses  are  mostly  roof,  composed  of 
red  tile,  the  eaves  often  within  six  or  seven  feet  of 
the  ground.  Methods  of  farming  in  that  section  are 
primitive,  the  maid  milks  the  cow  with  the  crumpled 
horn  in  the  morning,  hitches  her  to  the  plow  or  the 
cart,  with  perhaps  a  steer  or  a  mule  for  a  companion, 
and  performs  a  day's  labor. 

The  French  are  noted  for  their  frugality,  industry 
and  thrift.  They  thrive  and  accumulate  where  many 
of  our  Americans  would  fail  to  make  a  living. 

As  a  nation  they  have  shown  great  recuperative 
power.  Their  war  with  the  Germans  in  the  early  sev- 
enties was  an  expensive  affair.  Besides  the  loss  of 
more  than  5,000  square  miles  of  valuable  territory  in 
Alsace  and  Lorraine,  they  were  compelled  to  part 
with  a  large  amount  of  money.  Predictions  that 
they  would  be  bankrupted  were  freely  made,  but  it  re- 
quired but  a  few  years  for  a  full  recovery  of  the  money. 
They  parted  with  the  land,  however,  grudgingly,  and 


130  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

their  sighs  of  regret  have  not  ceased.  Their  invid- 
ious jealousy  of  the  Germans  will  be  a  long  time  dying 
out. 

As  every  one  knows  the  French  are  notorious 
as  being  the  most  impulsive,  passionate  and  erratic 
of  all  civilized  nations.  Self-government  of  the 
French  is  an  anomaly,  an  experiment,  which  will 
hardly  maintain  permanency.  France  has  tried  all 
sorts  of  government.  She  has  had  tyranny  and  revo- 
lution, been  ruled  by  kings  and  emperors.  Her  soil 
has  been  repeatedly  saturated  with  blood,  but  at 
present,  as  a  republic,  she  is  running  along  smoothly. 

As  we  approached  Paris  the  landscapes  were  more 
attractive,  the  soil  more  fertile ;  there  was  not  a  fence 
nor  a  stone  wall  to  mar  the  beauty,  not  a  barn  in 
France  of  any  size  and  the  thatched  stacks  were  really 
ornamental.  There  was  no  neglect  in  road-making, 
no  rubbish  in  sight.  Everything  orderly,  the  closely 
trimmed  hedges  and  the  cosy  cottages  enveloped  in 
flowers  and  shrubbery,  made  an  attractive  picture. 
Here  and  there  we  were  reminded  of  the  feudal  days 
of  the  middle  ages,  by  the  presence  of  an  old  castle  in 
ruins. 

Few  Frenchmen  leave  their  native  land  for  good, 
and  as  seen  within  one  hundred  miles  of  Paris  in 
August,  1900,  this  fact  is  readily  accounted  for. 

The  tedious,  tiresome  ride  of  nine  hours  locked  in 
a  French  carriage  facing  an  uncongenial  stranger, 
had  to  be  endured ;  even  the  luxury  of  a  drink  of  cold 
water  was  denied  us  and  the  heat  and  dust  was  oppres- 
sive. From  start  to  finish  we  were  in  charge  of  uni- 
formed, shoulder-strapped,  suave  officers  or  flunkies, 


FASCINATIONS  OF  THE  ALPS.  131 

whose  smiling  and  simpering  partially  offset  the  hard- 
ships referred  to. 

Accidents  on  French  railroads  are  rare,  first  they 
have  no  grade  crossings  and  second  they  have  no 
coroners,  nor  tender  hearted  juries  to  render  verdicts 
of  "unavoidable."  Negligence  of  official  duty  in 
France  means  punishment.  Everything  there  is 
subordinated  to  system,  it  requires  a  long  string  of 
red  tape  to  load  a  train  of  passenger  carriages,  to  start 
the  train  requires  more  red  tape,  and  the  discipline  ob- 
served in  the  conduct  of  the  train  across  the  country 
is  voluminous  enough  for  the  movement  of  a  standing 
army.  Some  portion  of  the  vast  army  in  France  is 
always  in  sight  and  always  making  a  show  of  being 
on  duty.  Unless  bribed  they  rummage  your  baggage 
for  things  dutiable,  but  our  conductors  informed  us 
that  the  mercenary  geniuses  were  low-priced  and 
easily  handled.  Fearing  that  prejudice  against  the 
French  army  on  account  of  the  treatment  of  Dreyfus 
may  lead  to  unjust  criticism,  I  will  make  no  further 
comments  on  the  French  army. 


GLITTERING  PARIS 


MECCA  FOR  THE  SPORTING  ELEMENT— THE  HOME   OF  FASHION 
AND  THINGS  BEAUTIFUL— HABITS  OF  THE  PARISIANS. 


Paris,  at  last,  the  metropolis  of  Bonnie  France, 
the  center  of  the  universe  if  splendor,  glitter  and  ex- 
travagance are  criterions  from  which  to  judge.  Ex- 
penditures in  this  city  of  fashion  for  ostentation, 
gayety  and  things  that  shine  and  glisten,  are  simply 
prodigal.  Paris  is  the  mother  of  fashion,  the  home 
of  decorations  that  are  gaudy  and  the  hot-bed  of  ex- 
cesses; the  city  where  wickedness  thrives  and  sin  is 
nourished,  where  all  phases  of  society  are  living  for 
the  present,  or  for  what  there  is  in  life  for  them  today. 
The  atmosphere  of  Paris  is  contaminated  with  the 
sporting  element,  and  poisoned  by  the  presence  of 
bawdy  houses  brazenly  plying  their  vocations  with  the 
sanction  of  the  city  authorities.  The  standards  or 
foundations  of  society  are  smirched  with  immoralities 
which  are  suppressed  even  in  New  York. 

The  churches  of  Paris  are  slimly  attended.  Patri- 
otism with  the  French  people  comes  before  religion, 
which  accounts  for  the  scarcity  of  churches  and  the 
absence  of  worshippers. 

Paris  has  2,660,000  inhabitants  and  a  large  portion 
of  the  city  is  a  fairy  land.  In  its  construction  and  its 
decorations  everything  has  been  subordinated  to  the 
one  idea  of  beautiful. 

The  parks,  boulevards,  public  gardens,  salons,  and 

132 


GLITTERING  PARIS.  133 

cafes  are  supplied  with  every  ornament  necessary 
to  make  them  attractive.  The  trimming  of  the  trees 
and  the  shrubbery,  the  cultivation  of  the  wilderness 
of  flowers,  the  arrangements  of  the  shady  nooks,  the 
landscapes  and  the  quiet  retreats  have  a  fascination 
seldom  if  ever  found  in  any  other  country. 

The  monuments  throughout  the  city  in  great  num- 
bers and  great  variety,  are  a  study  of  themselves. 
Everything  in  Paris  is  Frenchy,  from  the  waxed 
moustached,  kidded  porter,  or  the  faultlessly  dressed 
table  waiter  looking  longingly  and  smilingly  for  a 
franc  as  a  reward  for  some  fancied  favor,  to  the  irre- 
pressible cabman  lying  low  for  an  opportunity  to  col- 
lect from  you  twice  the  amount  he  is  entitled  to  by  a 
city  ordinance. 

In  all  the  long  string  of  servants  anxious  to  ac- 
cept your  favors,  you  look  in  vain  for  one  to  whom 
you  can  give  direction,  almost  without  exception  they 
are  as  dumb  as  horse  blocks.  To  break  through  the 
shell  of  a  Frenchman  and  impress  him  with  your 
English  or  to  understand  his  incomprehensible  jargon 
exhausts  both  patience  and  vitality.  In  Germany  by 
repeating,  by  running  the  risk  of  being  called  verbose, 
by  multiplied  gestures  and  loud  tones,  you  make  an 
impression  upon  the  poor  fellow,  get  what  you  go 
after  and  walk  away  in  triumph,  leaving  him  with  the 
false  notion  that  he  really  understands  English.  In 
Italy  you  have  about  the  same  run  of  luck  with  the 
Italians,  but  in  France  your  methods  are  a  dead  fail- 
ure. You  are  up  against  a  stone  wall.  The  French- 
man is  utterly  deaf  to  all  sounds  or  semblance  of  Eng- 
lish. If  you  wish  to  give  your  cabman  directions 


134  GLIMPSES    OF    EUROPE. 

you  proceed  to  have  him  spell  after  you  the  name 
of  the  street  and  number  but  to  save  his  bacon  he  can- 
not pronounce  either  and  at  last  throws  up  his  hands 
in  despair;  you  may  call  him  the  champion  blockhead 
of  Paris,  or  the  prince  of  idiots,  and  he  takes  it  all  in 
good  part  nodding  assent  to  every  declaration  you 
make.  While  you  are  wondering  whether  he  has 
ever  been  vaccinated  for  stupidity  or  whether  the  dis- 
ease is  afflicting  him  in  the  natural  way,  your  curiosity 
is  aroused  to  know  what  is  his  probable  opinion  of 
you.  While  he  can  neither  understand  nor  be  under- 
stood by  the  average  American  tourist,  he  no  doubt 
thinks,  or  at  least  he  thinks  he  thinks,  and  has  opin- 
ions all  his  own. 

The  residents  of  Paris  are  generally  pleased  to 
live  out  of  doors  seven  or  eight  months  of  the  year. 
You  see  them  swarming  in  the  public  gardens,  in  the 
parks,  in  the  shade  of  their  verandas,  along  the  boule- 
vards, or  sipping  wine  or  chocolate  in  front  of  the 
drinking  places.  From  4  p.  m.  until  midnight  in  the 
popular  portions  of  the  city,  they  are  swarming. 

A  life  free  from  care  and  responsibility  is  the  aim 
of  the  average  Parisian  and  yet  there  is  a  larger  per- 
centage of  suicides  and  homicides  than  in  any  other 
city  on  the  globe. 

From  perpendicular,  rocky  heights,  affording  a 
fall  of  nearly  two  hundred  feet,  in  the  northern 
suburbs  of  the  city  we  were  informed  that  an  average 
of  five  persons  a  week,  the  year  around,  made  a  leap 
from  the  pinnacle  to  the  jagged  rocks  below. 

Paris  shares  in  the  blessings  and  miseries  of 
antiquity.  Julius  Caesar,  before  the  Christian  era, 


GLITTERING  PARIS.  135 

found  in  the  identical  spot  now  occupied  by  the  great 
metropolis  a  little  hamlet  of  mud  huts  or  hovels,  oc- 
cupied by  the  Gallic  tribes. 

Some  of  the  customs  of  the  Parisians  are  repre- 
hensible. They  are  under  indictment  by  the  world 
at  large  for  a  phase  of  brutality  exhibited  toward  their 
dumb  animals  that  has  no  parallel.  The  treatment  of 
their  horses  is  unmerciful  and  often  sickening.  Of 
the  thousands  and  thousands  of  horses  exported  from 
America  to  Paris  to  be  used  for  exposition  purposes, 
probably  not  one  in  ten  was  worth  wintering  when  the 
exposition  closed.  They  were  neither  well-fed  nor 
well-cared  for,  they  were  loaded  without  stint  and 
whipped  in  the  most  inhuman  and  brutal  manner. 

Whether  their  consumption  of  horse  beef  con- 
tributes to  this  sort  of  savagery  is  a  question.  The 
horses  slaughtered  for  beef  or  for  their  meat  annually 
in  Paris  are  estimated  as  high  as  50,000,  one  firm  kill- 
ing 10,000  a  year.  This  beef  is  mostly  consumed  by 
the  lower  classes,  laboring  people  who  haven't  the 
price  of  a  steak  from  the  loin  of  a  steer.  This  horse 
beef  is  said  to  be  juiceless  and  lacking  flavor.  Amer- 
icans object  to  horse  steaks  on  account  of  prejudice. 
The  horse  is  the  cleanest  of  all  domestic  animals  and 
if  the  meat  had  the  relish  of  pork  it  ought  to,  with  the 
prejudice  eliminated,  stand  an  even  chance  with  the 
American  pig,  which  we  consume  in  great  numbers, 
as  everybody  knows  pigs  are  the  scavengers  of  all  cre- 
ation. They  eat  the  refuse  of  the  table,  the  kitchen 
and  the  barn  yard,  and  we  eat  the  pigs. 

We  took  a  carriage  drive  through  the  city  that 
lasted  throughout  the  day.  The  number  of  fine  bus- 


136  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

iness  places  and  the  immense  quantity  of  goods  on 
sale  were  an  amazement.  How  so  many  merchants 
manage  to  live  even  in  the  second  largest  city  in  the 
world  is  a  mystery.  We  visited  the  heights  of  a 
northern  suburb,  where  the  guns  were  located  during 
the  siege  of  Paris  in  1871.  Four  months  of  steady 
fire  by  the  Germans  brought  the  Parisians  to  terms. 
The  complete  blockade  of  the  city  starved  them  out. 
The  keen  demands  of  appetite  proved  too  much  and 
their  stomachs  surrendered. 

To  enumerate  the  elegant  palaces  and  fine  old  piles 
of  marble  scattered  about  the  city  would  be  a  severe 
task.  The  Louvre  and  Tuilleries,  now  practically 
one,  covering  sixty  acres  of  ground  in  the  heart  of 
the  city,  is  a  wonder  to  all  strangers.  The  lower  story 
of  the  Louvre  is  a  vast  retail  store  covering  acres  and 
acres,  with  miles  and  miles  of  counters,  and  clerks 
by  the  thousand.  Wanamaker's  of  New  York,  and 
Marshall  Field's  or  Siegel-Cooper's  of  Chicago,  are 
infants  compared  to  this  huge  conglomeration.  The 
exhaustless  variety  of  merchandise  on  sale,  embrac- 
ing the  products  of  every  clime,  is  suggestive  of  chaos 
and  confusion.  The  system  employed  in  the  arrange- 
ment of  this  gigantic  category  is  not  perfect  in  its  or- 
der or  regularity.  The  Bon  Marche  on  the  other  side 
of  the  city,  the  leading  rival  of  the  Louvre,  is  in  better 
form,  more  attractive  and  managed  with  better 
method.  At  the  Bon  Marche  it  is  only  necessary  to 
ask  for  what  you  don't  see  and  it  is  produced  imme- 
diately. In  these  great  establishments  there  is  a  full 
supply  of  clerks,  speaking  fairly  good  English,  which 
seems  necessary,  when  account  is  taken  of  50,000 


GLITTERING  PARIS.  137 

Americans  having  become  residents  of  Paris,  and  the 
multitudes  of  American  tourists,  and  their  wants  are 
considered. 

The  statue  of  Lafayette  erected  in  the  Garden  of 
the  Tuilleries  and  paid  for  by  the  pennies  contributed 
by  American  school  children,  is  a  fitting  credit  to  this 
country  as  well  as  a  mark  of  respect  to  our  faithful 
friend  at  the  time  of  this  country's  greatest  need. 

The  palace  Vendome,  famous  since  1658,  when  the 
Grande  Monarch  built  it ;  the  Arch  of  Triumph  mod- 
eled after  the  one  in  Rome,  with  its  bronze  horses  on 
the  top  and  the  central  place  of  all,  the  Place  de  la 
Concorde  were  all  visited  and  admired.  The  obelisk 
of  Luxor  with  fountains  and  wonderful  statuary  on 
every  side  is  a  feast  for  the  student.  Then  there  is  the 
Champs  de  Elysees,  more  than  a  mile  in  length  in  the 
handsomest  part  of  the  city,  offering  lovely  prome- 
nades, nooks  and  shelters,  where  you  may  take  lux- 
urious ease. 

The  architecture  of  Paris  embraces  all  the  most 
captivating  designs  (the  building  material  a  composi- 
tion called  staff  leads  in  the  construction).  Staff  is  as 
white  as  chalk.  Our  hotel,  the  Palais  de  Orsay,  just 
completed,  a  hostelry  with  six  hundred  rooms,  erec- 
ted without  much  reference  to  cost  and  ornamented 
with  gilt,  was  an  elegant  sample  of  Parisian  skill  and 
good  taste,  but  apparently  lacking  in  durability.  The 
mass  of  the  people  in  Paris  are  a  social  set,  while  caste 
is  not  lacking,  the  tendency  to  huddle  together  and  to 
move  in  flocks  is  everywhere  noticeable.  This  incli- 
nation or  drift  is  noticeable  in  and  about  the  drinking 
places  which  are  everywhere  present.  Drinks  in 


138  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

Paris  are  mainly  of  a  light  order,  light  native  wines, 
beer  with  a  small  percentage  of  alcohol  and  chocolate. 
These  drinks  are  sipped  and  usually  taken  with  delib- 
eration, whole  families  joining  in  the  social  glass. 
The  American  custom  of  gulping  down  alcoholic 
drinks  and  getting  full  on  the  shortest  possible  notice, 
does  not  prevail  in  Paris. 

Drunkenness  of  a  besotted  nature  is  not  common. 
The  faces  and  forms  of  the  drinking  Frenchman  do 
not  betray  that  swollen,  apoplectic  condition  especially 
evident  among  the  beer  drinkers  of  this  country.  In 
comparing  the  drink  habits  of  the  Parisians  with  the 
habits  and  customs  prevailing  in  this  country  but  one 
conclusion  is  reached,  namely,  that  the  American  who 
must  drink,  or  thinks  he  must,  could  with  propriety 
and  profit  take  lessons  from  the  Frenchman  on  his 
native  heath,  or  what  would  be  still  better,  to  con- 
clude, that  owing  to  his  peculiar  temperament  and  to 
the  American  trend,  the  wisest,  best  and  safest  thing 
to  do  is  to  let  all  alcoholic  drinks  severely  alone. 


FRENCH  HEROES 


NAPOLEON    AND    VICTOR    HUGO— FALL    OP    THE    BASTILE— CITY 
PRISONS— THE  SEINE— EIFFEL  TOWER  AND  THE  TROCADERO. 


Among  the  admirable  traits  of  the  Parisians  is  de- 
votion to  their  heroes.  Two  great  characters  tower 
above  all  others,  Napoleon  Bonaparte  and  Victor 
Hugo. 

A  carriage  drive  to  the  Hotel  Des  Invalides,  the 
home  for  worn-out  soldiers  of  the  nation  and  the 
burial  place  of  the  great  Napoleon,  made  deep  and 
lasting  impressions.  The  erection  of  the  immense 
home  begun  in  1670  and  completed  long  afterward; 
it  is  612  feet  long  and  four  stories  high.  It  has  a 
capacity  for  accommodating  6,000  soldiers,  but  a 
majority  of  the  rooms  were  empty.  It  surrounds 
an  immense  court  paved  with  a  rough,  flinty  rock 
not  altogether  attractive.  It  being  the  last  resting 
place  of  Napoleon,  calls  the  multitudes  who  visit 
Paris  to  pay  their  respects  and  to  satisfy  their  curio- 
sity. When  the  remains  of  the  general  were  brought 
from  St.  Helena  they  reposed  first  in  the  church 
in  close  proximity  to  the  present  tomb.  The  dome, 
under  which  the  remains  of  the  Corsican  now  lie, 
stilled  forever,  is  320  feet  high,  that  is  to  the  top 
of  the  cross,  which  surmounts  it.  To  reach  the 
sarcophagus  you  descend  a  winding  stairway,  you 
finally  look  down  into  a  sort  of  an  arena  or  crypt ;  the 
sarcophagus  consists  of  a  single  mass  of  porphyry, 
weighing  over  sixty  tons,  being  twelve  feet  long  and 

189 


140  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

six  feet  broad,  shaped  not  unlike  an  ordinary  burial 
case.  The  dying  request  of  Napoleon  is  engraved 
over  the  entrance  to  the  crypt  in  these  words:  "I 
desire  that  my  ashes  may  repose  on  the  banks  of 
the  Seine  in  the  midst  of  the  French  people  whom  I 
have  ever  loved."  An  elegant  statue  of  a  caged  eagle 
stands  near.  More  than  $2,000,000  were  spent  in 
building  this  monument  and  in  beautifying  its  sur- 
roundings. 

Around  the  outer  edge  of  the  crypt  are  dozens  of 
battle  flags,  tattered  and  old,  which  saw  service  in  the 
ranks  of  Napoleon's  armies. 

Grizzled  and  gray  old  veterans,  heroes  of  many 
struggles,  are  sitting  around,  living  over  again  the 
glories  of  their  fair  land  and  awaiting  the  approach 
of  the  grim  reaper. 

All  France  revels  and  delights  in  the  feats  and 
achievements  of  the  greatest  general  since  Hannibal 
and  Alexander.  For  the  present,  France  has  had 
enough  of  war,  but  the  tribute  they  pay  Napoleon 
Bonaparte  smacks  of  idolatry.  They  tell  us  that  at 
St.  Helena,  Napoleon  saw  clearly  how  he  might  have 
conquered  at  Waterloo,  but  there  must  have  been 
little  satisfaction  to  him  in  the  alas!  "too  late,"  "too 
late." 

We  visited  Napoleon's  gate  in  a  distant  part  of  the 
city,  a  massive  structure  172  feet  high,  through  which 
none  but  royalty  or  rulers  are  allowed  to  pass.  It  is 
a  magnificent  arch,  highly  ornamented  and  decorated 
with  costly  materials.  We  were  informed  that  the  re- 
mains of  the  late  Victor  Hugo  were  for  eight  days 
kept  in  state  under  this  arch,  where  the  multitudes 
were  permitted  to  take  a  last  look  at  their  dead  friend. 


FRENCH  HEROES.  141 

Victor  Hugo  is  remembered  not  only  as  an  author, 
a  poet,  a  sculptor,  and  a  genius,  but  as  a  man.  He 
was  one  of  the  greatest  writers  of  his  day,  and  the 
door  to  the  innermost  recesses  of  his  heart  and  soul 
was  always  ajar.  He  endured  persecutions,  he  ac- 
cepted banishment  but  lived  to  command  the  popular 
applause  of  his  countrymen  and  passed  away  in  the  full 
enjoyment  of  an  esteem  amounting  to  hero  worship. 
In  a  single  day  in  February,  1881,  700,000  people 
moved  by  a  spontaneous  impulse  defiled  in  a  dense 
crowd  before  the  great  poet's  house  and  greeted  him 
with  their  acclamations.  The  natures,  the  missions 
and  the  practices  of  these  two  great  leaders,  Napoleon 
and  Victor  Hugo,  were  as  unlike  as  it  is  possible  to 
imagine,  but  the  memory  of  each  is  cherished  with  a 
tenderness  that  is  touching. 

The  poems,  the  fiction,  the  genius  and  the  wisdom 
of  Victor  Hugo,  which  raised  his  fellow-men  into 
higher  levels,  will  live  and  remain  fresh  long  after  the 
brilliant  achievements  of  Napoleon  have  lost  their 
luster.  Admirers  of  these  characters  may  honestly 
differ  as  to  the  most  fitting  application  of  the  Latin 
phrase,  Sic  transit  gloria-  mundi. 

The  broad,  deep,  dark,  still  waters  of  the  Seine, 
which  for  eight  miles  courses  through  the  city,  offer 
a  cheap  and  agreeable  method  of  transportation. 
There  are  scores  of  passenger  boats  with  accommo- 
dations for  one  or  two  hundred  people,  noiselessly  ply- 
ing between  different  stations,  numbered  by  dozens. 
In  a  ride  to  Vincennes,  four  miles  up  stream,  we 
passed  under  twenty-four  bridges,  all  arched  and 
nearly  all  elaborated  by  fine  finish. 


142  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE, 

The  location  of  the  bastile  was  pointed  out  to  our 
party,  while  we  listened  to  the  blood-curdling  story 
of  the  fall  of  this  famous  French  prison.  It  was  orig- 
inally the  castle  of  Paris  and  was  built  by  order  of 
Charles  V,  in  the  thirteenth  century.  It  was  intended 
as  a  defense  against  the  English ;  when  converted  into 
a  prison  in  the  sixteenth  century  it  was  provided  with 
vast  bulwarks  and  ditches.  It  had  four  towers  of  five 
stories  each,  over  which  there  was  a  gallery  armed 
with  cannon.  Under  these  towers  and  partly  in  the 
cellars,  below  the  level  of  the  earth,  prisoners  were 
confined.  The  unfortunate  inmates  of  these  prisons 
were  so  effectually  removed  from  the  world  without, 
as  to  be  often  forgotten,  and  there  were  cases  where  it 
was  impossible  to  find  the  cause  or  the  origin  of  their 
incarceration.  The  inmates  were  usually  guilty  of 
political  despotism,  court  intrigue,  or  ecclesiastical 
tyranny.  They  consisted  of  noblemen,  authors, 
priests  and  publishers.  On  July  14,  1789,  an  armed 
mob  worked  up  to  a  state  of  fury  by  the  reactionary 
policy  of  the  court,  surrounded  the  bastile,  besieged 
it,  killed  and  wounded  150  people,  and  captured  the 
famous  prison,  the  fall  of  which  changed  the  current 
of  events  in  France.  This  important  event  is  still 
commemorated  by  a  celebration  each  and  every  year. 

The  city  prison  with  its  dark,  grim  old  walls  was 
shown  us,  and  its  records  of  scenes  of  blood  which 
were  detailed  in  all  their  horrid  particulars..  We  saw 
the  broad-ax  or  guillotine  and  the  block  where  decap- 
itation had  been  practiced  for  ages.  There  was  the 
groove  in  the  pavement,  fashioned  to  carry  away  or 
conduct  the  life-blood  of  the  unfortunate  culprit. 


FRENCH  HEROES.  143 

Five  prisoners  were  inside  the  walls  awaiting  execu- 
tion from  which  there  was  no  alternative. 

The  Madeline,  the  most  famous  cathedral  in  Paris, 
with  its  stately  columns,  was  designed  by  Napoleon  I, 
as  a  sort  of  pantheon  where  statues  of  the  greatest 
heroes  of  France  might  be  placed,  but  Napoleon  was 
in  exile  before  its  completion  and  it  was  dedicated  to 
public  worship.  There  is  little  in  the  look  outside 
suggesting  a  church  but  it  makes  up  for  this  on  the  in- 
side as  it  contains  a  world  of  costly  ornaments. 

The  Trocadero,  built  for  the  uses  of  the  Paris  Ex- 
position in  1878,  is  a  museum  of  museums.  If  you 
wish  to  study  ethnology  by  the  month  the  Trocadero 
offers  an  opportunity. 

The  Eiffel  Tower,  985  feet  high,  just  oposite,  com- 
mands a  full  view,  not  only  of  the  city,  but  a  vast  ter- 
ritory beyond.  From  the  top  of  the  tower  men  and 
women  on  the  streets  below  appear  about  as  large  as 
brownies,  and  the  topmost  floor  was  too  far  removed 
from  the  common  level  to  get  an  intelligent  or  satis- 
factory view. 

The  construction  of  the  tower  is  a  marvel,  built 
entirely  of  iron  and  steel,  its  four  feet  are  thirty  rods 
apart  at  the  base.  Many  hundreds  can  be  accommo- 
dated at  once  upon  its  three  floors,  where  refresh- 
ments are  served,  where  there  are  opportunities  to  in- 
vest your  money  in  souvenirs,  or  to  write  to  your 
friends  at  home. 

Going  back  to  the  Trocadero  and  its  tower  or  ob- 
servatory from  which  you  look  down  at  the  city  lying 
at  your  feet,  including  the  exposition  grounds,  the 
view  is  simply  grand;  and  then  the  rooms  filled  with 


144  GLIMPSES    OF   EUROPE. 

sculpture  and  paintings,  works  of  art,  gems,  the  most 
wonderful  aquarium,  where  the  inhabitants  of  the 
ocean  could  be  studied;  the  natives  of  nearly  every 
country  on  the  globe  in  wax  figures,  families  dressed 
in  native  costumes,  in  groups  surrounded  with  agri- 
cultural and  industrial  implements;  the  family  homes 
and  all  they  contain  as  seen  in  all  the  grand  divisions 
of  the  globe  and  in  many  of  the  islands  of  the  sea. 

To  give  a  detailed  account  of  the  Paris  Exposi- 
tion at  this  late  date  would  hardly  be  expected  or  ap- 
preciated. As  an  aggregation  of  the  world's  handi- 
work it  was  never  equalled.  Comparing  it  with  the 
Chicago  exposition,  it  fell  far  short  in  many  partic- 
ulars and  excelled  in  many  others.  Extending  along 
both  banks  of  the  Seine  its  buildings  were  at  a  great 
disadvantage  by  being  wedged  in  between  densely 
populated  portions  of  Paris.  In  other  words  the  ex- 
position buildings  which  were  many  of  them  elegant, 
equal  to  the  best  seen  in  Chicago,  showed  to  a  great 
disadvantage  by  reason  of  a  lack  of  room. 

Representations  of  the  world's  industries  were  on 
a  scale  never  before  approached. 

At  Philadelphia  in  1876  the  great  Corliss  engine 
was  the  center  of  attraction  and  the  admiration  of  the 
populace,  at  Paris  within  thirty  minutes  I  counted 
sixteen  engines  in  operation  that  would  average 
nearly  or  quite  as  large  as  the  famous  Corliss.  The 
Paris  Exposition  as  a  show  was  a  grand  success ;  as  an 
enterprise  a  financial  failure.  Hundreds  of  people 
who  bought  privileges  on  the  grounds  were  bank- 
rupted owing  to  lack  of  attendance,  although  the  tick- 


FRENCH  HEROES.  145 

ets  of  admission  during  the  last  two  months  were  sold 
at  five  and  six  cents  apiece. 

England  gave  Paris  the  go-by  on  account  of  some 
old  scores.  A  Liverpool  gentleman  informed  me  that 
the  treatment  received  by  Queen  Victoria  in  the  Paris 
newspapers  in  March,  1900,  kept  5,000,000  of  English 
people  away  from  the  exposition.  He  said  "I  am  a 
large  manufacturer  and  belonged  there  with  my 
goods,  I  fully  intended  to  go  until  the  insults  were 
heaped  upon  the  Queen,  whom  we  all  love,  after 
which  I  felt  it  my  duty  to  resent  the  injury  and  stayed 
away." 

This  was  an  unusual  demonstration  of  self-denial 
but  served  to  illustrate  the  fidelity  of  the  English  peo- 
ple to  their  rulers.  France  paid  dear  for  the  slanders 
of  an  unscrupulous  press,  the  raillery  of  which  was 
entirely  uncalled  for.  Such  freaks  of  the  Paris  news- 
papers are  not  uncommon  but  the  enterprise  of  the 
French  people  in  the  production  of  this  vast  exhibi- 
tion is  worthy  of  praise.  Its  collection  of  paintings 
and  statuary  was  on  a  scale  never  before  attempted 
and  is  not  likely  to  be  excelled  in  the  world's  history. 


BEAUTIFUL  VERSAILLES 


FOUNTAINS  AND  PARKS— LAVISH  EXPENDITURE— AN  ABYSS  OF 
EXCESSES— ARTISTIC  COLLECTIONS  IN  ITS  MONSTER  PALACE 
—SOCIAL  ROTTENNESS  AND  UNCHASTE  INDECENCIES. 


Versailles  is  a  suburb  of  Paris,  a  city  of  60,000  in- 
habitants, lying  eleven  miles  down  the  Seine.  It  is 
an  old  city,  historically  and  in  fact.  It  has  a  record 
for  many  things  peculiar  and  unique.  It  has  long 
been  the  leading  play  ground  of  the  Parisians. 

To  reach  Versailles  by  public  thoroughfare  you 
go  up  a  steady  incline,  until  an  elevation  of  nearly  500 
feet  above  sea  level  is  reached. 

There  are  few  if  any  industries  at  Versailles.  Most 
of  the  people  live  off  the  tourists,  and  the  stock  in 
trade  of  the  city  is  its  record,  its  palace  1,400  feet  long, 
its  Trianons  and  a  few  other  public  resorts  making 
the  city  interesting. 

Versailles  has  probably  the  finest  fountains  in  the 
world ;  the  park  consisting  of  hundreds  of  acres  in  the 
center  of  which  is  located  a  vast  fountain,  adorned 
with  the  most  expensive  ornaments  that  money  would 
purchase.  All  about  the  miniature  lake  there  are 
bronze  effigies,  colossal  statues,  curving  jets  of  spark- 
ling water,  grass  carpeted  avenues,  and  little  silvan 
lakes  upon  which  are  sailing  miniature  ships.  The 
playing  of  the  fountains  cost  for  each  time  from  two 
to  three  thousand  dollars  and  under  electrical  effects 
are  fascinating. 

The   three   Louis   and   Napoleon   Bonaparte  are 

146 


BEAUTIFUL  VERSAILLES  147 

credited  with  the  gorgeous  beauty,  magnificence  and 
extravagance  at  Versailles.  It  is  said  that  these  four 
men  expended  in  that  little  city  200,000,000  of  dol- 
lars; this  included  the  cost  of  <the  public  thoroughfare 
leading  to  Paris.  It  was  this  prodigal  use  of  the  peo- 
ple's money  that  worked  insurrection  and  revolution. 

The  creating  of  its  marvelous  parks  at  enormous 
cost  was  at  a  time  when  bread  was  scarce  and  poor 
people  were  suffering.  Louis  XIV  kept  36,000  men 
employed  on  a  tract  of  land  sixty  miles  in  circumfer- 
ence for  a  long  period.  The  palace  which  is  today  in 
a  good  state  of  preservation  is  one  of  the  products  of 
their  labor.  It  contains  museums  of  art,  the  rarest 
paintings  and  sculpture  in  all  France;  it  is  the  store- 
house for  the  choicest  of  the  world's  gifts.  It  has 
wonderful  tapestries  and  decorations  lavished  on  its 
hundreds  and  hundreds  of  rooms.  These  rooms  are 
finished  with  the  rarest  and  most  costly  wood,  carved 
in  the  most  fantastic  manner.  It  has  mosaics  in  such 
quantities  that  to  the  sight  seer  they  cease  to  be  in- 
teresting. Some  of  the  rooms  are  immense,  fifty  by 
one  hundred  and  fifty  feet,  with  histories  saturated 
with  the  blood  of  nobles  and  kings. 

Versailles  was  long  the  seat  of  government  and 
the  headquarters  of  things  sensational.  It  is  now  the 
capital  of  Department  of  Seine  Et  Oise.  It  has  long 
been  the  residence  of  the  French  court,  and  the  career 
of  Napoleon  was  closely  identified  with  it.  Ap- 
proaching the  front  of  the  palace  our  conductor  point- 
ed out  the  balcony  in  the  second  story  where  the  ill- 
fated  Marie  Antoinette  stood  on  the  night  of  October 
5th,  1789,  having  been  previously  awakened  from 


148  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

sleep  by  the  howling  of  the  Paris  mob  demanding 
bread  or  blood.  We  were  told  that  her  husband 
Louis  XVI  was  too  terrified  to  protect  either  her  or 
himself,  that  they  were  captured,  dragged  away  to 
Paris,  tortured  for  a  time  and  finally  guillotined.  All 
Versailles  abounds  in  portraits  and  paintings  of  the 
beautiful  Marie  Antoinette,  who  paid  the  penalty  of 
being  the  wife  of  a  weak,  cowardly  craven,  without 
character  or  regard  for  his  subjects. 

In  one  of  the  rooms  of  the  palace  William  of  Prus- 
sia was  crowned  as  emperor  after  the  victory  of  Alsace 
Lorraine  in  1871,  and  to  the  great  humiliation  of  the 
French  people  William  continued  to  occupy  this  room 
and  the  palace  for  six  months.  The  walls  of  its  long- 
est and  most  extensive  hall  are  adorned  with  immense 
paintings  of  all  the  battles  in  which  Napoleon  Bona- 
parte was  engaged.  It  is  in  these  paintings  and  in 
this  room  that  Frenchmen  seem  to  reach  the  highest 
plane  of  enjoyment. 

Of  course  no  tourist  could  in  a  single  day  do  even 
partial  justice  to  150  galleries  of  paintings  and  sculp- 
ture, really  needing  a  whole  year  for  study  and  thor- 
ough digestion. 

We  strolled  also  through  the  Grand  Trianon  and 
the  Petit  Trianon,  monuments  of  folly,  lavish"  and  ex- 
cessive waste  of  money.  These  buildings  are  but  one 
story,  perhaps  twenty  feet  to  the  ceiling;  there  is  a 
multitude  of  rooms  filled  with  souvenirs  of  Napoleon 
I,  of  Josephine  his  wife,  and  three  dead  kings,  with  as 
many  queens.  There  were  rooms  'for  every  use  con- 
ceivable and  they  were  furnished  in  the  most  expen- 
sive manner.  The  furniture  being  suited  to  the  de- 
mands of  one  to  two  hundreds  years  ago. 


BEAUTIFUL  VERSAILLES  149 

The  use  of  gold  in  decorations  was  as  common 
then  as  the  use  of  brass  is  now.  Perhaps  the  place 
attracting  the  most  attention  was  the  bedroom,  where 
several  kings  and  queens  had  slept  in  succession. 
The  bed  created  of  the  most  costly  and  elegant 
materials,  a  sumptous  affair,  has  long  been  without  an 
occupant.  We  were  told  that  Queen  Victoria,  when 
visiting  Versailles  a  few  years  since,  refused  to  sleep 
in  this  bed  when  she  learned  that  Josephine,  the 
divorced  wife  of  Napoleon,  was  the  last  one  to  occupy 
it.  In  an  immense  dining  room  was  located  the  table 
at  which  the  lascivious  Louis  XIV  and  his  mistress 
Madame  Maintenon,  and  after  them  Louis  XV  and 
Pompadour,  his  concubine,  sat  at  their  meals.  Napo- 
leon spent  an  average  of  about  two  weeks  in  each  year 
in  the  midst  of  these  gorgeous  and  luxurious  sur- 
roundings. Near  at  hand  are  stables  filled  with  car- 
riages decorated  with  gold  and  used  by  former  kings 
and  queens  of  France  only  on  state  occasions,  that  is, 
when  an  imperial  head  was  to  be  crowned  or  a  royal 
infant  christened.  These  carriages  were  curious  in 
their  construction,  one  of  them  weighing  eight  tons 
and  costing  $48,000  was  drawn  by  eight  white  horses ; 
their  fine  workmanship  is  going  to  decay,  their  former 
golden  luster  has  been  modified  by  the  dusts  of  one  to 
two  centuries;  and  then  there  were  curious  sleighs 
with  bodies  shaped  like  wild  animals. 

There  were  statues  of  favorite  horses,  life-size, 
harnesses  and  saddles  decked  with  gold  and  silver. 

But  the  darkest  spot  in  Versailles  was  the  soldiers' 
barracks  and  prison,  but  a  step  from  the  palace.  Here 
were  confined,  at  one  time  in  the  early  seventies, 
15,000  Frenchmen,  who  belonged  to  the  Commune, 


150  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

men  whose  hands  were  red  with  the  blood  of  their 
countrymen.  Our  conductor  related  to  us  the  story 
of  their  surrender  to  the  federalists,  of  their  loyalty 
to  the  Commune,  of  the  offer  made  to  them  by  the 
government  to  allow  them  to  go  free,  by  taking  an 
oath  of  allegiance  to  the  government,  of  their  refusal, 
and  the  sentence  of  the  entire  number  to  be  shot. 
Detailing  the  hideousness  of  the  killing  of  15,000  men 
he  said :  "They  were  brought  out  into  this  open  space 
fifty  at  a  time,  were  shot  to  death,  their  bodies  taken 
away,  another  fifty  were  brought  out;  this  perform- 
ance, he  said,  lasted  for  five  weeks  or  until  the  last  one 
was  killed.  Oh !  the  bloodiest  picture  in  the  book  of 
time." 

Although  the  French  revolution  occurred  more 
than  a  century  ago,  there  are  many  traces  around 
Paris  and  Versailles  of  the  "Reign  of  Terror"  which 
existed.  A  study  of  the  causes  which  led  to  that  hor- 
rible climax  should  be  deeply  impressed  upon  the 
minds  of  all  rulers  and  political  leaders.  It  was  the 
outgrowth  and  culmination  of  misgovernment,  of  dis- 
regard of  the  rights  of  the  majority,  usurption  of 
power,  waste  and  extravagance  of  the  people's  money, 
placing  the  burdens  of  taxation  upon  the  helpless 
and  those  least  able  to  bear  the  burdens,  and  allowing 
the  capitalists  to  go  nearly  or  quite  Scot-free.  These 
evils  and  outrages  ended  in  exasperation  and  desper- 
ation ;  when  the  flame  once  broke  forth  there  was  no 
stopping  it  until  it  had  run  its  course. 

The  story  of  Josephine  is  full  of  sadness.  She, 
whose  undying  devotion  had  never  failed  the  great 
Napoleon  and  under  whose  guidance  he  had  learned 


BEAUTIFUL  VERSAILLES  151 

to  believe  in  a  lucky  star,  a  star  not  overhead  but  by 
his  side.  This  woman  who  had  shared  in  his  brilliant 
achievements  was  doomed  to  be  cast  off  and  the  cruel 
hand  which  forced  that  decree  of  divorce  knew  but 
little  of  success  or  fortune  afterward.  Defeat  and 
ruin  stamped  the  career  of  Napoleon  after  that  fateful 
edict. 

In  bidding  France  adieu  I  leave  many  things  un- 
said which  would  give  the  reader  a  more  intelligent 
insight  of  the  checkered  lives  of  the  Parisians.  Of 
their  pride  in  their  city,  of  their  enterprise  in  beauti- 
fying it,  of  their  52,000  acres  of  parks,  the  real  lungs 
of  Paris,  too  much  in  praise  cannot  be  said.  Of  the 
glimpses  of  their  botanical  gardens,  of  their  thousands 
of  trees,  fantastically  shaped  by  their  skillful  pruning 
knives,  of  the  broad  boulevards  taking  the  place  of 
narrow  streets  and  alleys.  Credit  and  admiration  is  due 
to  a  people  imbued  with  such  enterprise,  good  taste, 
pluck  and  perseverence,  but  to  the  wicked  and  vicious 
propensities  of  the  lower  classes,  to  the  sights  and  the 
scenes  along  the  lanes  and  dark  alleys,  where  poverty 
and  crime  join  hands,  where  a  human  life  is  not  worth 
a  picayune,  and  where  the  atmosphere  is  dense  with 
violence,  there  is  an  ever  present  suggestion  of  perdi- 
tion. The  pages  of  this  volume  should  not  and 
must  not  be  the  medium  of  detailing  the  immorali- 
ties of  Paris,  which  stalk  abroad  and  strut  in  broad 
daylight,  in  the  presence  of  decency  and  morality, 
without  shame,  hindrance  or  apology.  Paris  is  a 
city  of  theaters,  suited  to  the  wants  of  all  grades 
of  society  from  the  highest  to  the  lowest.  From  the 
elite,  which  gather  by  thousands  in  its  opera  house 


152  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

costing  $5,500,000,  besides  the  ground,  to  the  resort 
pandering  to  the  lowest  instincts  of  humanity,  the 
place  which  Saxe  fittingly  portrayed  in  "Le  Jardin 
Mabile"  in  the  following  lines : 

"But  see !  where  the  people  are  closing  about, 
Two  brazen-browed  women — arid  hark  to  the  shout, 
La  Can-can !  they're  at  it,  no  wonder  you  stare. 
One  foot  on  the  pavement — now  two  in  the  air ! 
A  Cockney,  intent  on  this  rarest  of  shows, 
Retreats  from  the  shoe  that  is  grazing  his  nose. 
Good  lack !  till  he  dies,  he'll  remember  the  heel 
That  spoiled  his  new  hat  in  the  Jardin  Mabile. 

"  'A  pity !'  you  sigh — and  a  pity  it  is 

Such  revels  should  shame  such  a  garden  as  this; 

Where  all  that  is  charming  in  nature  and  art 

Serves  only  to  sully  and  harden  the  heart. 

'The  Devil's  own  hot-house !'  you  musingly  say, 

While  turning  in  sadness  and  sorrow  away, 

Reflecting  that  sin — as  you  potently  feel 

Is  the  thriftiest  plant  in  the  Jardin  Mabile." 


FAREWELL  TO  PARIS 


ALONG  THE  WAY  TO  THE  GREAT  METROPOLIS— LONDON,  THE 
MODERN  BABYLON— ITS  ECCENTRIC  CHARACTERS— CON- 
SERVATISM OF  ENGLISH  PEOPLE. 


A  round  of  sight  seeing  in  the  French  metropolis, 
lasting  twelve  days,  ended,  and  with  it  the  treat  to 
which  full  justice  could  not  be  done  in  twelve  months. 

The  exposition  will  be  remembered  for  a  few 
things  at  least.  Its  diamond  found  in  the  Transvaal 
just  previous;  to  the  breaking  out  of  the  African  war 
weighing  239  carats  and  insured  for  $2,000,000,  was 
perhaps  the  most  conspicuous  item  in  the  exhibition. 
Enclosed  in  a  large  glass  case  and  mounted  on  a  pivot 
its  many  sides  were  steadily  exhibited  to  the  swarms 
of  people  who  will  never  see  its  like  again ;  and  then 
there  were  the  rooms  and  rooms  by  scores,  finished 
and  furnished  with  exquisite  taste  and  great  variety 
by  enterprising  house  builders  and  house  furnishers, 
making  it  easy  for  people  having  the  price  to  select  a 
home  and  to  furnish  every  room  in  the  house.  The 
dressmakers  and  milliners  of  Paris  furnished  the  feasts 
for  the  eyes  of  the  ladies  by  mounting  the  latest  fash- 
ions upon  wax  figures  true  to  life.  There  were  hun- 
dreds of  these  exhibits  representing  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  dollars.  Some  of  these  queens  of  fashion 
were  adorned  with  dresses  costing  up  into  the  thou- 
sands, having  trains  three  to  four  yards  in  length. 

The  show  of  dry  goods,  both  foreign  and  domes- 
tic, was  never  equalled.  The  circular  elevated  railway, 

163 


154  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

the  circular  moveable  sidewalks  making  both  fast 
and  slow  time,  serving  as  a  relief  to  the  tired  pilgrims, 
were  some  of  the  pleasant  features  to  be  remembered. 

And  then  the  home  of  Count  de  Castellane,  the 
spend-thrift,  who  won  the  heart  and  hand  of  pretty 
Anna  Gould.  This  home,  or  so-called  palace,  is  loca- 
ted not  far  from  the  exposition  grounds,  is  an  unat- 
tractive pile  of  marble  without  comeliness.  Its  high 
raised  battlements  intended  for  protection  of  the  bel- 
ligerent count  against  his  numerous  enemies,  or 
against  possible  Paris  mobs,  is  a  prominent  feature  of 
the  $100,000  residence  which  might  easily  be  mis- 
taken for  a  prison.  According  to  the  Paris  reporters 
poor  Anna  has  shed  many  hot  tears,  and  suffered 
much  humiliation  on  account  of  the  squandering  of 
her  fortune  and  the  disgraceful  conduct  of  her  hus- 
band. Her  experience  will,  not,  however,  prove  an 
object  lesson  to  other  pretty  American  heiresses  who 
\vill  in  the  future  be  won  by  long  hair  and  a  foreign 
title. 

Four  hours  to  Calais,  through  a  country  more  or 
less  broken,  brought  us  back  to  the  English  channel ; 
along  the  route  we  saw  large  quantities  of  wheat  rot- 
ting in  the  shocks,  the  effects  of  the  recent  rains. 
There  were  Percheron  horses  in  great  numbers  of  all 
ages,  and  white  French  cattle,  which,  barring  their 
large  horns,  were  not  unlike  the  short-horns  of  Amer- 
ica. This  was  a  stretch  of  country  where  farmers  were 
apparently  attending  strictly  to  business  and  the  well 
kept  fields  and  farm  buildings  indicated  prosperity. 

We  found  the  English  channel  on  its  good  behav- 
ior and  during  our  ride  of  twenty-one  miles  across  to 


FAREWELL  TO  PARIS.  155 

Dover  the  channel  conducted  herself  with  the  utmost 
propriety.  The  career  of  this  body  of  water  is  a 
checkered  one.  To  illustrate,  a  portion  of  our  party 
crossing  two  days  later  encountered  one  of  the  worst 
storms  in  the  history  of  the  channel.  Every  passenger 
was  sick  unto  death  and  unable  to  help  their  friends 
or  themselves.  Landing  at  Dover  our  contest  of 
thirty-six  days  with  strange  tongues  and  incompre- 
hensible dialects  ended.  The  king's  English,  al- 
though frequently  murdered,  was  never  better  appre- 
ciated ;  such  a  sudden  transition  from  a  babel  of  voices 
to  the  American  tourist  is  a  delight  and  a  comfort 
difficult  to  describe. 

Dover,  rock-bound  with  its  chalk  hills  for  a  back- 
ing, has  a  substantial  look,  suggestive  of  a  great  fort. 
The  city  is  neither  large  nor  important  except  as  the 
seaport  leading  to  the  continent;  the  reader  may  re- 
member that  it  was  at  Dover  we  embarked  for  Ostend, 
Belgium,  a  distance  of  seventy  miles.  Passengers  who 
pass  through  Dover  to  the  continent  are  every  year 
numbered  by  millions.  A  quick  ride  of  seventy  miles 
from  Dover  brought  us  to  London,  where  a  gentle- 
manly officer  made  a  hurried  examination  of  our  bag- 
gage and  we  were  whirled  away  to  the  Great  Central, 
a  first-class  hostelry  of  extensive  proportions,  located 
in  a  part  of  the  city  far  distant  from  the  hotel  of  our 
first  visit. 

Three  days  at  the  Great  Central  furnished  an  in- 
sight of  the  high  life  of  the  metropolis.  The  Great 
Central  was  built  by  a  syndicate,  is  one  of  seven  of 
similar  proportions,  erected  without  much  regard  to 
cost,  the  aim  evidently  being  to  make  them  attractive 


156  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

to  the  elite,  the  people  to  whom  money  is  no  object. 
The  wealth,  the  fashion  and  the  extravagance  cen- 
tered at  the  Great  Central  was  not  in  harmony  with 
the  scenes  of  poverty  and  destitution  two  or  three 
blocks  away.  Almost  in  sight  of  this  monument  of 
elegance  and  this  home  of  gayety  there  were  huts 
where  squalor  and  depravity  are  never  relieved  and 
where  a  ray  of  sunshine  or  hope  never  enters. 

But  a  stone's  throw  from  the  home  of  the  rounded, 
beef-fed  magnates  to  an  allegory  of  starvation. 

The  barmaids  at  the  Great  Central,  chosen  for 
their  fine  forms  and  faces  and  not  lacking  in  fashion- 
able attire,  showed  by  their  smiles  that  they  are  never 
impressed  with  the  thought  that  their  calling  is  not 
one  of  respectability.  The  custom  of  London,  and  in 
fact  of  England,  raises  no  objection  to  the  fact  that 
girls  belonging  to  good  families  occupy  these  posi- 
tions, nor  that  the  wide-open  saloon  doors  admit  men, 
women  and  children  of  all  classes  who  are  waited  upon 
by  these  barmaids.  To  see  women  reeling  along  the 
walks  of  London,  often  with  babes  in  their  arms,  ex- 
cites little  or  no  remark. 

While  the  cities  of  America  are  sadly  in  need  of 
reform  along  these  lines  they  are  not  for  a  moment  to 
be  compared  with  London,  Glasgow  and  Dublin. 

If  I  were  to  invade  the  precincts  of  John  street, 
White  Chapel  or  Drury  Lane  and  attempt  to  detail 
or  describe  the  demoralization,  hideousness  and  utter 
abandonment  of  the  residents  of  those  dens  of  crime, 
my  fear  is  that  the  picture  would  be  set  down  as  an 
exaggeration  of  facts. 

London  is  by  far  the  greatest  of  all  commercial 
centers  and  the  Babylon  of  the  present  day.  It  was 


FAREWELL  TO  PARIS.  157 

once  the  capital  of  an  ancient  British  tribe,  and  when 
ruled  by  the  Romans  in  the  early  centuries  was  one 
of  the  chief  stations  of  Britain.  The  Romans  encir- 
cled what  is  now  but  a  small  portion  of  the  city  with 
a  wall  about  two  miles  in  extent.  London  was  plun- 
dered and  burned  by  the  Danes  in  the  ninth  century, 
since  which  it  has  passed  through  many  a  crisis  but 
has  managed  to  maintain  its  prestige  as  the  metropo- 
lis of  the  nation. 

Stricken  with  the  plague  in  1665  its  population 
was  diminished  by  hundreds  of  thousands,  the  people 
dying  at  the  rate  of  6,000  a  day.  All  business  was 
suspended  except  burying  the  dead  and  grass  grew 
in  the  middle  of  the  business  streets,  even  in  front  of 
the  royal  exchange,  then  and  now  the  center  of  popu- 
lation. The  plague  was  followed  in  1666  by  the  great 
fire  which  devastated  a  large  portion  of  the  city  and 
which  was  afterward  construed  as  fortunate  on 
account  of  the  destruction  of  the  germs  of  the  plague, 
which  have  never  appeared  since.  The  people  ren- 
dered homeless  by  the  fire  fled  to  the  country,  built  a 
temporary  city,  which  answered  their  purpose  until 
the  burned  district  was  rebuilt  on  a  more  substantial 
basis.  Probably  no  city  in  the  universe  has  ever 
digressed  so  little  from  a  marked  individuality  as  the 
city  of  London.  England  has  characteristics  all  her 
own,  and  these  traits  are  intensified  in  its  metropolis. 

To  study  the  faces  of  the  multitude  as  they  swarm 
through  the  leading  thoroughfares  is  a  rare  feast  and 
an  amusement.  The  versatile  Dickens  without  this 
opportunity  could  never  have  charmed  the  millions  to 
the  extent  that  he  did  with  his  tales  of  fiction.  The 


158  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

Peggotys,  the  Trotwoods,  the  Traddles,  the  Sam  Wel- 
lers,  the  Micawbers,  the  Bill  Sykes's,  the  Barkis's,  the 
Pickwicks  and  the  Uriah  Keeps  are  all  there,  readily 
identified  by  the  clever  and  close  observer.  There  are 
thousands  and  thousands  of  Londoners,  who  have 
never  been  out  of  sight  of  their  great  city,  who  have 
bloomed  and  faded  within  the  sphere  of  St.  Paul's  or 
within  hearing  of  its  chimes. 

That  London  should  be  a  Sahara  for  things  sin- 
gular is  not  surprising;  that  dense  ignorance  and 
social  depravity  should  obtain  a  firm  foothold  is  not 
odd;  that  the  presence  of  royalty  should  stimulate  a 
class  of  sycophants  who  attempt  to  simulate  or  ape 
the  forms  and  customs  of  their  superiors,  and  to  coun- 
terfeit distinguished  airs,  is  less  strange.  A  stroll 
through  the  parks  reveals  the  social  remnants  of  dilap- 
idated humanity  by  hundreds,  who  are  so  thoroughly 
wedded  to  London  and  its  ever  changing  panorama, 
that  to  be  removed  to  the  country  or  to  any  other 
locality  would  be  a  punishment  hard  to  endure. 

Never  having  breathed  the  free  air  of  heaven  nor 
enjoyed  a  full  day  of  unbroken  sunlight,  these  desolate 
patriarchs  have  no  conception  of  what  they  have  lost. 
They  have  become  the  willing  victims  of  unfortunate 
environments. 

It  costs  London  immensely  to  punish  her  crimi- 
nals and  to  keep  her  degenerate  elements  within 
proper  limits.  Arrests  for  crime  number  more  than 
100,000  a  year,  and  nearly  or  quite  50  per  cent  of 
those  charged  are  punished. 

London  is  much  better  governed  than  New  York. 
Criminals  have  more  to  fear,  as  violations  of  the  law 


FAREWELL  TO  PARIS.  159 

always  mean  something,  and  there  is  much  less  sickly 
sentimentality  floating  around  than  in  the  cities  of 
America. 

The  conservatism  of  the  English  in  some  respects 
is  very  annoying  to  American  tourists.  If  their  cur- 
rency was  less  cumbrous  and  more  readily  compre- 
hended it  would  be  much  better  for  all  concerned.  To 
comprehend  the  pounds,  shillings,  pence  and  farthings 
takes  but  a  short  while,  but  those  superfluities,  the 
crown  and  the  half  crown,  to  the  stranger,  and  their 
similarity  to  silver  having  a  different  value  makes  con- 
fusion which  should  be  obviated. 

The  crown  having  a  value  of  about  $1.20,  or  five 
shillings  of  English  money,  to  a  stranger  is  likely  to  be 
mistaken  for  four  shillings  or  a  value  corresponding 
with  our  silver  dollar,  and  the  half  crown  is  similar  in 
size  to  an  English  two-shilling  piece  or  an  American 
half  dollar,  and  then  there  is  the  English  three-pence 
too  small  for  a  pocket  piece  and  the  English  penny 
huge  and  unsightly;  all  their  currency,  except  the 
crown  and  half  crown,  reminding  an  American  of  our 
currency  previous  to  the  civil  war.  If  there  is  any  one 
thing  more  than  all  others  in  this  country  that  war- 
rants a  pardonable  pride,  it  is  our  system  of  currency, 
its  simplicity  and  adaptation  to  the  wants  and  neces- 
sities of  every  class,  its  soundness  and  convenience, 
places  our  gold,  silver,  paper  and  nickels  above  criti- 
cism, and  without  a  rival  in  the  universe. 

There  is  less  wild  speculation  in  London  than  in 
New  York,  values  of  stocks  and  bonds  offered  for 
investments  are  more  definite  and  certain  and  as  a  rule 
fluctuate  less  in  England  than  in  this  country.  A 


160  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

Liverpool  capitalist  largely  interested  in  railroads 
informed  me  that  there  were  few  watered  railroad 
stocks  in  Britain — in  an  American  sense.  He  said, 
"when  it  is  decided  to  build  a  railroad  a  close  estimate 
is  made  by  the  company  of  the  cost  of  everything 
entering  into  its  construction  and  equipment,  includ- 
ing the  cost  of  all  its  depots,  and  the  stock  therefor  is 
issued  and  sold  at  par.  Twenty  years  later,  perhaps, 
when  it  becomes  necessary  to  demolish  the  depot 
costing  200  pounds  and  replace  it  with  one  costing 
500  pounds,  additional  stock  for  500  pounds  is  issued, 
and  that  is  the  limit  to  the  watering  of  railway  stocks 
in  Britain." 

In  England,  he  remarked,  "our  aim  is  to  make  our 
investments  in  railroads  dividend  paying,  but  not 
speculative.  To  carry  passengers  and  freight  as 
cheaply  as  we  can  afford,  and  to  give  the  best  service 
possible."  In  the  matter  of  road-beds  and  depots  they 
are  far  in  the  lead  of  America,  but  in  equipment,  so 
far  as  all  rolling  stock  and  strictly  first-class  train 
service  is  concerned,  Britain  from  an  American  stand- 
point can  hardly  be  considered  as  in  the  game. 


WINDSOR  AND  ITS  CASTLE 


THE  QUEEN'S  FARM— QUAINT  OLD  OXFORD  AND  ITS  UNIVERSITY 
—WARWICK  AND  ITS  ANTIQUITIES. 


Bidding  adieu  to  London  a  ride  of  twenty-one 
miles  on  the  Great  Western  railway  brought  us  to  the 
antiquated  old  city  of  Windsor,  noted  chiefly  for  its 
castle.  It  is  here  that  Queen  Victoria  each  year  for 
a  long  period  spent  from  six  weeks  to  six  months,  it 
being  her  leading  summer  residence. 

Two  miles  from  Windsor  is  located  the  large  farm, 
where  Prince  Albert  in  the  later  years  of  his  life  spent 
his  time  in  the  management  of  the  hundreds  of  acres 
devoted  to  agriculture  and  the  rearing  of  live  stock, 
rivaling  the  best  produced  in  the  world.  For  a  person 
having  a  taste  for  agricultural  pursuits,  this  farm  is  a 
charming  spot.  The  meat,  including  the  poultry, 
flour,  the  vegetables,  milk,  (and  feed  for  an  average 
of  fifty  carriage  horses  kept  at  Windsor,  needed  for 
use  in  the  royal  family)  all  come  from  this  farm,  and 
if  the  queen  with  her  family  was  not  at  Windsor  these 
necessaries  of  life  were  forwarded  to  her,  wherever  she 
might  be.  In  an  opposite  direction  from  Windsor 
and  not  far  away,  is  the  royal  forest,  once  containing 
about  sixty  thousand  acres.  And  there  is  Windsor 
park  containing  oaks  made  famous  by  the  attachment 
of  Queen  Elizabeth  and  Shakespeare;  and  then  there 
is  Queen  Anne's  row  of  elms  three  miles  long,  once 
the  pride  of  Windsor. 

The   city  proper  has  about   15,000  inhabitants, 

161 


162  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

which  is  probably  much  less  than  the  population  300 
years  ago,  as  at  that  time  the  town  was  celebrated 
for  the  number  of  its  inns,  there  being  seventy  places 
which  were  dignified  by  such  euphonious  names  as 
the  Garter,  the  White  Hart,  the  Black  Bull,  the  Red 
Horse,  the  White  Cow,  etc.,  etc.  The  Garter  was  the 
favorite  inn  of  Shakespeare's  FalstafT,  and  in  "The 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor"  is  often  mentioned. 

Windsor  castle  has  a  commanding  position.  It 
has  a  stately  group  of  ancient  buildings  with  historical 
connections  and  perhaps  the  most  magnificent  of  all 
royal  palaces.  There  are  no  signs  of  neglect  or  decay 
to  be  seen  but  evidences  of  large  expenditures  in 
recent  years  for  additional  buildings,  including  a  large 
round  tower,  the  whole  structure  resting  upon  a 
mound  of  chalk  and  containing  seventeen  acres.  The 
Thames  is  crossed  here  by  a  bridge  resting  on  three 
granite  piers,  and  a  fine  view  of  the  great  river  and 
the  fertile  country  in  all  directions  can  be  had  from 
the  top  of  the  tower. 

Down  the  main  thoroughfare,  but  a  short  distance 
from  Windsor,  rests  Queen  Victoria's  remains  beside 
the  dust  of  Prince  Albert.  Fortunes  have  been  spent 
in  preparation  for  the  royal  dead  at  this  burial  place, 
known  as  Frogmore. 

It  required  a  whole  bolt  of  red  tape  to  get  through 
the  castle,  first  it  was  necessary  to  fill  certain  benches 
in  the  ante-room  to  complete  the  number  necessary 
to  secure  admittance,  and  when  inside  the  lines,  and 
in  charge  of  a  guide,  whose  long  service  had  seemed 
to  endow  him  with  an  acute  sanctity,  we  were  conduc- 
ted from  room  to  room  with  all  the  solemnity  and  pre- 


WINDSOR  AND  ITS  CASTLE.  163 

cision  needed  for  a  royal  obsequies.  The  rooms  in 
the  castle  are  numerous,  too  numerous  to  enumerate. 
Some  of  them  are  lined  with  polished  marble,  with 
Gothic  windows  and  richly  stained  glass.  There 
were  portraits  of  sovereigns,  of  kings  and  queens, 
panels  of  mosaics  representing  Biblical  scenes,  and 
floral  designs  that  were  beautiful.  Hurried  explana- 
tions made  by  our  guide  as  we  passed  from  room  to 
room  amounted  to  a  sort  of  tweedle-dum  and  twee- 
dle-dee.  His  accounts  of  the  valuables  consisting  of 
paintings,  statuary,  vases,  fire-arms,  and  a  thousand 
and  one  presents  to  the  queen  from  nearly  all  the 
nations  of  the  earth,  were  confusing  and  failed  to 
properly  impress  the  sight-seers.  Windsor  castle  is 
but  one  of  the  several  store-houses  where  this  class  of 
goods  are  preserved  for  the  royal  family  and  its  suc- 
cessors. 

Proceeding  a  few  miles  further  brought  us  to  the 
old  college  town  of  Oxford.  It  was  there  that  per- 
haps a  majority  of  the  leading  statesmen,  poets  and 
men  of  letters,  which  during  the  past  eight  hundred 
years  have  in  Great  Britain  received  their  education 
or  equipment  for  the  battle  of  life. 

If  there  was  anything  pleasing  or  calculated  to  in- 
spire students  of  the  university  with  a  college  attach- 
ment, we  failed  to  find  it.  The  black  and  grim  old 
buildings  covering  many  acres,  were  sandwiched  in 
between  structures  of  great  variety,  showing  the  in- 
roads of  time.  Its  ancient  walls  are  beginning  to 
crumble,  and  there  was  a  spooky  appearance  and  an 
air  of  desolation  in  its  multitude  of  halls.  There  was 
no  college  campus  in  sight,  and  the  narrow  streets  and 


164  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

narrow  alleys  gave  a  wierd  and  dismal  appearance  to 
the  famous  university. 

The  popularity  of  the  university  several  centuries 
ago  was  so  great  that  to  obtain  a  scholarship,  or  to 
get  into  the  college,  application  must  be  made  by  the 
student  years  in  advance,  and  the  tuition  was  three  to 
five  times  as  great  as  the  tuition  charged  in  American 
colleges  of  the  first  class. 

Oxford  is  a  city  of  about  50,000  inhabitants  with 
little  to  recommend  it  as  being  of  a  progressive  kind. 
The  fat,  lame,  old  horse  which  pulled  our  car  up  the 
long  road  from  the  depot  to  the  university,  would,  in 
Paris,  have  been  a  quick  candidate  for  a  horse-beef 
stall. 

Between  these  cities  of  moderate  size,  rural  Eng- 
land presents  a  fine  appearance.  These  last  days  of 
August  finds  the  farmers  up  to  their  elbows  in  their 
harvest.  The  great  crop  of  wheat  is  now  going  into 
stacks  and  the  contrast  between  the  methods  em- 
ployed in  England  and  America  to  secure  the  grain 
is  amusing  to  the  tourist.  The  grain  is  drawn  with 
clumsy,  one-horse  carts,  the  loads  are  small  and  four 
men  are  employed  usually  to  do  two  men's  work  in 
this  country,  and  as  before  stated  everything  in  the 
line  of  grain,  for  want  of  barns,  goes  into  stacks  that 
are  skillfully  thatched.  Harvest  weather  is  usually 
precarious  in  England,  as  rain  often  makes  a  destruc- 
tive interference.  An  American  wonders  how  it  is 
possible  to  secure  their  wheat,  when  rain  is  falling 
nearly  every  day  in  the  month,  but  the  occasional  day 
with  bright  sunshine  is  made  the  most  of  by  working 
far  into  the  night.  We  saw  the  gleaners,  consisting 


WINDSOR  AND  ITS  CASTLE.  165 

of  whole  families,  making  a  clean  sweep  of  the  stubble- 
fields  for  a  last  head  of  grain,  and  their  harvest  was 
a  surprise  to  us.  Haying  is  well  under  way,  but  the 
thick  old  meadows  with  their  heavy  fleeces  of  grass 
are  about  as  green  as  ever,  while  the  second  crop  of 
clover  is  ready  for  the  machine.  If  days'  works  are 
desirable  the  harvest  hands  of  Britain  have  little  to 
complain  of.  The  system  observed  by  the  managers 
of  large  farms  and  the  lessees  of  English  estates  in  the 
employment  of  farm  labor  differs  widely  from  our 
American  customs.  In  Britain  it  is  not  uncommon 
for  families  to  find  employment  continuously  on  the 
same  farm  for  generations.  The  head  of  the  family 
retired  by  the  weight  of  years  is  succeeded  by  a  son 
who  becomes  the  cart-man,  the  ploughman,  or  the 
keeper  of  the  live  stock,  as  the  case  may  be.  Trained 
in  his  calling  from  childhood  he  is  expert  in  the  duties 
he  is  called  upon  to  perform.  He  has  learned  from  his 
father  the  importance  of  being  reliable  and  faithful 
and  he  can  be  depended  upon  by  his  employer,  whose 
interests  are  not  neglected.  The  proprietor  furnishes 
this  class  of  tenants  a  house  and  in  addition  to  the 
yearly  wages  adds  to  the  compensation  by  gifts  or 
presents,  which  have  the  effect  of  cementing  or  mak- 
ing close  the  relations  between  the  employer  and  em- 
ployed. My  information  is,  that  the  time  serving, 
indifferent  farm  hand  in  England,  is  a  rare  exception, 
although  his  compensation  is  less  than  the  amounts 
paid  by  American  farmers.  The  root  crops  of  Eng- 
land are  a  large  item  in  their  farming  operations, 
carrots,  beets,  and  turnips  entering  into  their  stock 
growing.  The  flocks  of  black-faced,  well-rounded, 


166  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

heavy  muttons  in  hurdles  on  the  turnip  fields  was  a 
feature  of  mutton  producing  not  familiar  to  Ameri- 
cans. The  mutton  produced  by  these  turnips  is  of  a 
quality  which  our  sheep  feeders  would  do  well  to  con- 
sider. While  English  farming  proceeds  by  slow  and 
conservative  processes  there  are  lessons  and  lessons 
offered  which  could  be  studied  with  propriety  by 
American  farmers. 

A  further  ride  of  a  few  miles  from  Oxford  brought 
us  to  the  quaint  old  town  of  Warwick,  which,  to  be  in 
harmony  with  our  surroundings,  should  be  pro- 
nounced "Warrick."  This  typical  old  city  has  about 
12,000  inhabitants,  is  not  growing  and  is  apparently 
non-progressive. 

It  has  historical  reminiscences,  reaching  back 
many  centuries,  which  are  interesting.  The  original 
plat  of  the  city,  which  seems  never  to  have  been 
amended,  is  a  curiosity. 

We  stayed  over  night  at  the  "Woolpack"  hotel, 
centrally  located,  owned  and  kept  by  a  sister  of  W.  P. 
Knapp,  of  Elyria.  The  house  was  not  only  in  the 
center  of  the  town,  but  out  from  the  little  paved  park 
from  in  front  of  the  house  narrow  streets  led  in  all 
directions.  The  plan  of  the  engineer  didn't  contem- 
plate squares,  right  angles,  nor  uniformity  in  the  size 
of  his  blocks ;  some  of  the  buildings  fronting  this  little 
square  were  scarcely  ten  feet  in  front,  widening  as  they 
extended  back.  The  business  places  were  of  an 
ancient  type,  low  ceilings,  and  styles  of  architecture 
long  since  out  of  date. 

In  the  suburbs  of  the  city,  or  away  from  the  center, 
there  were  many  beautiful  sights  and  desirable  homes. 


WINDSOR  AND  ITS  CASTLE.  167 

Nature  was  a  liberal  contributor  in  making  Warwick 
one  of  the  most  desirable  spots  in  England. 

There  are  many  ancient  land  marks  in  the  old  city, 
the  leading  one  being  Warwick  castle,  nearly,  or  quite 
one  thousand  years  old.  About  one-half  the  old 
structure  is  in  ruins,  the  other  half  is  habitable.  It 
was  destroyed  by  the  wars  of  Henry  some  years  after 
its  construction  and  was  but  partially  built  up.  The 
original  tower  still  stands.  There  are  a  great  number 
of  rooms  in  the  habitable  portion  which  are  filled  with 
curios,  pictures,  busts,  marbles,  cabinets,  vases, 
curiously  inlaid,  antiques  and  wonders  of  art. 

The  famous  Warwick  vase  which  fifty  years  since 
was  found  during  a  drouth  at  the  bottom  of  a  lake 
near  Adrians'  villa,  by  Sir  William  Hamilton,  is  loca- 
ted at  the  castle.  It  was  excavated  and  moved  here 
where  it  is  exhibited  as  one  of  the  leading  relics  of 
ancient  days.  The  vase  is  without  doubt  2,000  years 
old  and  a  perfect  specimen  of  Greek  art.  It  is  twelve 
feet  in  diameter  at  the  top  and  is  about  ten  feet  high. 

Warwick  has  some  tall  cedars  of  Lebanon  in  its 
spacious  garden.  These  trees,  which  were  used  in 
the  construction  of  Solomon's  temple,  are  famed 
throughout  the  world.  The  trees  at  Warwick  were 
brought  from  Palestine  many  years  ago.  It  is  said 
that  these  trees  are  found  nowhere  else  in  the  world 
except  in  California.  The  tall  trees  of  the  Yosemite 
are  claimed  to  be  the  descendants  of  the  cedars  of 
Lebanon,  but  how  they  got  there  neither  history  nor 
tradition  attempt  to  explain. 


FROM  WARWICK  TO  STRATFORD 


THE   BIRTHPLACE   AND   RESTING  PLACE   OF  WILLIAM    SHAKES- 
PEARE—THE COTTAGE  OF  ANN  HATHAWAY. 


A  ride  by  rail,  lasting  something  more  than  an 
hour,  transferred  our  little  party  from  Warwick  to 
Stratford,  the  birth  place  and  resting  place  of  the 
greatest  of  all  dramatic  writers,  William  Shakespeare. 
Readers  and  admirers  of  Shakespeare  approach 
Stratford,  not  with  morbid  curiosity,  but  with  an 
ecstatic  contemplation  and  enthusiasm,  and  a  feeling 
of  awe  and  reverence. 

The  little  city  of  8,000  inhabitants  has  a  world- 
wide notoriety  due  to  its  being  the  home  of  the  great 
poet. 

Everything  in  Stratford  is  Shakesperian.  Arriv- 
ing at  the  Stratford  depot  our  party  refused  the  impor- 
tunities of  the  persistent  hackmen,  and  we  strolled  up 
the  long  street  to  the  center  of  the  little  city,  passing 
on  the  way  little,  low,  thatched,  steep-roofed  cottages 
of  original  types  and  ancient  brands.  Some  of  them 
were  lighted  by  window  panes,  six  inches  square; 
their  huge  chimneys,  out  of  harmony  with  their  size, 
made  an  odd  and  unique  appearance.  We  passed  also 
the  Shakespeare  monument,  erected  in  the  middle  of 
the  main  street  at  an  important  crossing  by  the  late 
George  W.  Childs,  the  Philadelphia  philanthropist,  at 
a  cost  of  $25,000.  The  monument  is  a  beautiful  tri- 

168 


FROM  WARWICK  TO  STRATFORD.  169 

bute  to  the  memory  of  one  for  whom  this  man  had  the 
greatest  admiration. 

Engaging  a  carriage  later  for  a  round  of  sight- 
seeing, we  were  first  driven  to  the  home  and  birth- 
place of  the  Bard  of  Avon.  There  was  nothing  strik- 
ing in  this  house  of  sixteen  rooms  as  it  differed  but 
little  from  the  other  cottages  in  the  same  row — which 
were  built  on  the  line  of  the  street.  These  cottages 
were  old-fashioned  in  architecture  long  since  obsolete. 
Their  antiquated  appearances,  especially  this  one,  is 
largely  due  to  its  great  age,  having  been  built  in  the 
fifteenth  century  and  more  than  350  years  ago. 

John,  the  father  of  William  Shakespeare,  came  to 
Stratford  from  a  near-by  town  about  1550.  He  was 
a  young  man  of  much  promise  and  in  a  short  time 
took  a  high  position  in  the  municipal  affairs  of  the 
village.  During  the  first  five  years  of  his  Stratford 
life  he  held  the  dignified  positions  of  leet-juror,  ale- 
taster,  constable,  affeeror,  burgess,  chamberlain  and 
alderman ;  later  he  became  chief  bailiff,  and  mayor  of 
the  town,  and  was  further  honored  by  the  titles  of 
gentleman,  master  and  esquire.  John  Shakespeare 
prospered  and  at  the  end  of  five  years  when  his  accu- 
mulations reached  the  munificent  sum  of  five  hundred 
pounds  he  married  Mary  Arden,  from  the  country 
near-by.  Little  is  known  of  Mary  except  that  she 
was  an  heiress,  "a  gentlewoman  of  good  appearance 
and  good  repute." 

This  sixteen-room  house  was  purchased,  where 
eight  children  were  born  to  John  and  Mary,  four  boys 
and  four  girls.  The  two  oldest  were  girls  and  died 


170  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

in  infancy.  The  third  was  a  boy  and  was  named 
William. 

Whether  the  honors  and  emoluments  of  office 
combined  with  marrying  an  "heiress"  proved  too 
great  a  strain  upon  the  poise  of  John  is  not  stated,  or 
whether,  due  to  bad  luck  or  bad  management,  that  he 
lost  the  most  of  his  property  is  a  mooted  question,  but 
reverse  after  reverse  brought  John  and  his  family  to 
low  estate.  They  parted  with  the  lands  that  Mary 
had  inherited,  in  fact  everything  went  except  the 
home,  including  the  titles  and  the  standing  of  the  once 
proud  and  imperious  John  Shakespeare.  His  occupa- 
tion had  been  dealer  in  grain,  cattle,  lumber,  etc.,  but 
with  reduced  capital  he  settled  down  to  the  business 
of  glover ;  making  gloves  and  leggins  for  the  farmers 
round  about.  This  business  was  carried  on  in  one  of 
the  back  rooms  of  the  cottage  and  for  many  years 
seems  to  have  been  a  strife  against  fate  and  a  struggle 
for  a  livelihood.  John  was  often  humiliated  by  being 
sued  for  debt  but  managed  to  keep  out  of  prison. 
From  necessity  the  doctor  and  I  ducked  our  heads 
when  we  entered  the  cottage. 

After  paying  the  customary  shilling  our  suave  and 
courteous  guide  conducted  us  through  the  establish- 
ment, detailing  the  uses  made  of  the  different  rooms 
by  the  Shakespeares.  In  the  main  living  room  on  the 
first  floor  was  a  huge  old-fashioned  fire  place  rein- 
forced by  an  immense  brick  oven,  the  two  covering 
more  than  one-half  of  one  side  of  the  room.  In  front 
of  the  fire  place  were  some  huge  flat  stones,  which  con- 
stituted the  hearth.  Imagine  the  mother  cooking  over 
the  fireplace,  baking  bread  in  the  oven  and  availing 


FROM  WARWICK  TO  STRATFORD.  171 

herself  of  such  primitive  conditions  in  the  care  and 
support  of  her  family  and  you  picture  the  lives  of 
thousands  of  American  women  of  the  eighteenth  and 
nineteenth  centuries.  From  this  room,  up  a  rickety 
dilapidated  pair  of  winding  stairs,  we  were  shown  into 
the  place  where  William  Shakespeare  first  saw  the 
light.  This  room  was  perhaps  sixteen  feet  square, 
very  low  between  joints,  with  two  little  windows  in 
front,  filled  with  old-fashioned  glass  of  small  propor- 
tions. The  plaster  on  the  walls  consisting  of  one 
dark  coat  and  covering  the  spaces  between  the  huge 
timbers  added  to  the  gloom  and  darkness  of  the  sur- 
roundings ;  the  wood-work  here  was  of  the  very  plain- 
est and  all  ornamentation  was  over-looked.  The 
floor  of  wide  boards  which  have  managed  to  survive 
this  great  lapse  of  time  were  creaky  and  shaky ;  on  the 
walls  and  on  the  window  panes  were  the  evidences  of 
the  multitudes  of  visitors  from  all  parts  of  the  globe, 
who  have  found  their  way  to  this  dingy  and  decaying 
inclosure. 

Thousands  and  thousands  of  names  cut  in  the 
timbers,  written  on  the  walls  and  scratched  with  dia- 
monds upon  the  window  panes,  tell  the  tales  of  their 
presence.  They  rank  from  the  highest  to  the  lowest. 
I  recall  the  names  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  Thomas  Car- 
lyle,  T.  B.  Macauley,  Chas.  Dickens,  and  Lord  Byron, 
each  evidently  the  possesor  of  a  diamond. 

Returning  to  the  first  floor  we  were  shown  into  the 
library.  Here  was  an  immense  quantity  of  the  origi- 
nal manuscript  of  Shakespeare's  writings.  An  exam- 
nation  showed  that  the  English  and  diction  used  in 
the  fifteenth  century  had  improved  but  very  little 


172  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

upon  the  original.  Here  also  was  the  library  left  by 
John  Shakespeare  and  the  early  accumulations  of  his 
son.  There  were  guns,  pipes,  snuff  boxes  and  other 
property  of  the  poet,  there  was  also  the  desk  occupied 
by  Shakespeare  at  the  grammar  school  near-by,  where 
he  obtained  all  the  technical  education  he  ever  had. 
This  desk,  made  of  rough  boards,  was  as  rude  and  un- 
sightly in  its  construction  as  can  be  imagined.  The 
seat  was  too  high  for  the  boy's  feet  to  obtain  even  a 
speaking  acquaintance  with  the  floor.  A  ten  year 
old  boy  with  some  rough  boards,  a  hammer  and  a 
few  nails,  would  now  be  expected  to  produce  a  much 
better  outfit. 

Outside  of  the  house  and  mainly  in  the  back  yard 
was  a  well  kept  flower  garden  and  a  few  old  trees, 
which,  if  favored  with  voices,  might  be  interesting. 
This  property  after  the  death  of  William  got  into  the 
hands  of  a  shrewd,  far-sighted  butcher,  who  without 
any  poetry  in  his  nature  sold  sheeps'  heads  and  pigs' 
livers  in  the  front  room. 

Something  more  than  a  half  a  century  ago,  the 
English  government,  for  a  large  sum,  said  to  be  three 
thousand  pounds,  purchased  this  property  and  with 
the  revenues  received  from  it  is  doing  its  best  to  pre- 
serve it  in  its  original  type  and  naturalness. 

In  the  temperament  of  the  poet  there  seems  to 
have  been  a  happy  blending  of  the  qualities  pos- 
sessed by  the  father  and  mother.  John  is  said  to  have 
been  passionate,  arrogant,  and  impulsive,  while  Mary 
was  the  exact  opposite — calm,  considerate  and  love- 
able.  William  possessed  the  emotional,  fiery,  ambi- 
tious traits  of  his  father  and  the  generous,  noble  and 


FROM  WARWICK  TO  STRATFORD.  173 

magnanimous  qualities  of  his  mother.  He  is  de- 
scribed as  being  a  Chesterfield  in  his  address,  pos- 
sessed of  rare  magnetic  qualities,  and  as  a  boy  and  a 
man  always  at  ease  and  at  home  in  every  possible 
phase  of  society.  He  conversed  as  freely  and  as  natur- 
ally with  the  hodman  on  his  ladder  and  the  ploughman 
in  his  furrow,  as  with  kings,  queens  and  princes,  and 
he  had  the  love  and  respect  and  admiration  of  all  alike. 
In  his  childhood  he  is  described  as  being  a  robust, 
hazel-eyed,  curly-headed  boy,  who  never  missed  an 
opportunity  of  being  present  at  the  sheep-washings 
and  pig-killings  at  his  grandfather's  in  the  country. 
The  shepherds  and  the  farm  hands  in  all  the  country 
round  about  were  his  companions.  He  was  familiar 
with  every  hill  and  every  shady  nook  in  that  undulat- 
ing country. 

Like  Sir  Walter  Scott,  he  had  a  penchant  for  soli- 
tude. He  sought  the  stillnes  of  the  dense  forests,  he 
listened  for  hours  to  the  babbling  of  the  running 
brooks,  and  the  songs  of  the  warblers  in  their  native 
groves.  The  exhilarating  breath  of  the  highlands  in 
the  distance  added  to  the  vitality  of  the  rugged  consti- 
tution. The  wild  flowers  and  sweet  herbage  that 
fringed  the  forests  were  all  familiar  to  him,  and  in  his 
wanderings  among  the  trees  he  received  an  inspira- 
tion which  later  in  life  in  his  "As  You  Like  It"  found 
his  well-known  expression :  "And  this,  our  life,  ex- 
empt from  public  haunt,  finds  tongues  in  trees,  books 
in  running  brooks,  sermons  in  stones  and  good  in 
everything."  This  communion  with  the  gentle  whis- 
perings of  nature  was  a  valuable  preparation  for  the 


174  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

life  to  follow,  and  mirror-like  was  reflected  in  his  pro- 
ductions. 

The  reverses  and  necessities  of  John  Shakespeare 
took  William  from  school  at  the  age  of  fifteen,  when 
he  became  a  helper  in  the  manufacture  of  gloves.  1 
can  imagine  his  keen  disappointment  in  not  being 
sent  to  Oxford  instead.  He  had  little  taste  for  the 
work  but  the  lesson  taught  during  the  four  years 
which  he  remained  at  home  was  without  doubt  a  valu- 
able one.  Unlike  his  father,  he  proved  a  prudent, 
successful  business  man  in  every  way  and  to  the  great 
gratification  of  his  parents  he  applied  some  of  the  first 
money  made  from  his  writings  to  their  use,  relieving 
them  of  all  distress  and  restoring  his  father's  titles, 
making  their  last  years  happy  by  his  contributions. 

At  the  age  of  nineteen  William  married  Ann  Hath- 
away, a  girl  that  he  had  known  from  childhood,  seven 
years  his  senior.  It  was  a  happy  union,  three  chil- 
dren were  born  to  them,  the  last  two  being  twins. 

From  childhood  Shakespeare  had  shown  a  taste 
for  the  drama,  he  visited  all  the  theaters  within 
reach,  and  before  his  marriage  had  written  a  few  plays 
which  were  dramatized  and  demonstrated  that  the 
mind  of  the  writer  was  both  creative  and  receptive. 

Not  being  satisfied  with  Stratford  he  drifted  away 
to  London,  took  a  subordinate  position  in  a  theater  as 
an  actor  and  during  his  twenty  years  stay  in  London 
won  both  fame  and  fortune.  His  last  ten  years  were 
spent  in  Stratford,  where  his  public  spirit  and  benevo- 
lences endeared  him  to  the  hearts  of  the  people.  He 
had  marked  social  qualities  and  was  a  royal  enter- 
tainer. Born  in  1564  he  passed  away  in  1616,  aged 


FROM  WARWICK  TO  STRATFORD.  175 

fifty-two  years.  A  sickness  lasting  but  three  days  (a 
malignant  fever)  following  an  entertainment  of  Ben 
Johnson  and  other  celebrated  characters. 

We  saw  the  foundation  of  the  house  where  he  died. 
It  was  located  near  the  church,  where  his  remains 
were  deposited.  The  house  was  burned  many  years 
ago.  At  the  church  in  the  crypt  under  the  chancel 
and  under  a  plain  marble  slab  rests  all  that  remains 
of  the  brilliant  man,  whose  powers  were  an  enigma 
and  whose  writings  were  a  marvel  and  an  amazement, 
that  stand  today  without  a  rival. 

We  were  shown  through  the  large  memorial  hall, 
erected  to  his  memory.  It  is  filled  with  paintings, 
books,  statuary  and  souvenirs  of  great  variety  and 
value.  From  the  top  of  the  hall  in  the  tower  the 
beautiful  Avon  may  be  traced  in  its  various  meander- 
ings  through  a  delightful  country,  also  the  famous 
roads  leading  away  to  Birmingham  and  Northampton, 
the  birthplace  of  our  honored  citizens,  Richard  Baker, 
Henry  Eady,  Mrs.  Lantsbury  and  others.  Also  may 
be  seen  to  the  north  of  the  city  only  a  mile  away 
among  the  elms,  the  spot  where  our  late  distinguished 
citizen,  Hon.  N.  S.  Towshend,  was  born  and  spent  his 
early  boyhood. 

Our  last  call  was  out  on  the  winding  road  in  the 
suburbs,  at  the  cottage  of  Ann  Hathaway.  This  cot- 
tage is  low,  long  and  wide,  with  a  heavy,  thatched  roof 
resting  upon  it  like  a  hood,  reaching  well  down  toward 
the  earth.  Government  ownership  is  also  reserving 
its  originality.  Our  sixpence  obtained  admission  and 
a  seat  on  the  rude  bench  in  front  of  the  broad  fireplace, 
where  we  imagined  the  young  lover  sat  with  his  bride 


176  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

in  the  early  days  of  their  housekeeping.  Near  at 
hand  was  the  rude  bed  they  occupied,  which  would 
hardly  be  accepted  as  a  resting  place  by  the  poets  of 
the  present  day.  With  a  drink  of  cold  water  from  the 
old  well  and  some  flowers  picked  in  an  adjacent 
garden,  from  the  hand  of  the  good-natured  tenant,  I 
left  Stratford,  making  a  note  of  this  visit  as  one  of  the 
rarest  treats  enjoyed  in  Europe. 


BUSY  BIRMINGHAM 


ITS  STACKS  AND  SMOKE— OLD  CHESTER,  CITY  OP  THE  ROMANS 
—PEOPLE  NONPROGRESSIVE,  HAPPY,  CONTENT  AND  FOND  OF 
THEIR  ODDITIES. 


From  Stratford  back  to  Warwick  and  on  to  Ches- 
ter consumed  but  a  few  hours. 

We  made  a  short  stop  at  Birmingham,  one  of  the 
leading  cities  of  Britain,  and  one  of  the  few  greatest 
of  all  strictly  manufacturing  cities  in  the  world. 
Birmingham  has  a  population  of  about  500,000  inhab- 
itants. Its  industries,  or  its  reputation  as  a  manufac- 
turing city  reaches  back  several  centuries.  The  city 
has  about  9,000  houses  occupied.  These  houses  are 
mostly  of  brick,  and  such  a  sameness  in  architecture  is 
rarely  seen. 

The  thing  which  impresses  the  stranger  most  at 
Birmingham  is  its  chimney  stacks  and  its  smoke. 
The  stacks  are  numbered  by  hundreds,  scattered 
away  as  far  as  the  eye  can  reach.  The  smoke  issuing 
from  these  chimneys  seemed  to  form  into  clouds  and 
settle  down  on  the  city  with  a  density  equalling  a  Lon- 
don fog. 

Birmingham  from  away  back  has  been  the  seat  of 
metal  manufacture ;  ten  thousand  people  find  employ- 
ment in  its  brass  shops.  Jewelry,  made  of  gold,  silver 
and  gilt,  comes  next.  Small  fire-arms,  buttons,  hooks 
and  eyes,  pins,  etc.,  keep  a  multitude  of  operatives 
busy,  and  then  there  is  table  glass  which  finds  a  mar- 

177 


178  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

ket  in  all  civilized  countries,  manufactured  in  aston- 
ishing quantities.  The  city  has  long  had  the  prestige 
of  being  the  headquarters  for  screws  and  nails,  but 
the  most  remarkable  of  all  the  tales  told  of  her  indus- 
tries was  the  account  of  her  output  of  steel  pens. 
Fifteen  tons  of  steel  per  week  is  rolled  out  into  thin 
plates  and  manufactured  into  steel  pens,  one  man  has 
constantly  employed  sixty  tons  of  steel  in  the  various 
stages,  and  completes  twenty  million  pens  every  six 
days;  this  fact  gives  a  faint  conception  or  criterion  of 
the  vastness  of  the  population  of  the  civilized  world. 

A  writer  in  speaking  of  the  industries  of  Birming- 
ham says,  "We  cannot  move  without  finding  traces  of 
the  great  hive  of  metal  makers,  the  veritable  descend- 
ants of  Tubal-cain." 

At  home  or  abroad,  sleeping  or  waking,  walking 
or  riding,  in  a  carriage  or  upon  a  railway  or  steam- 
boat we  cannot  escape  reminiscences  of  Birmingham. 
She  haunts  us  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave.  She  sup- 
plies us  with  the  spoon  that  first  brings  our  infant  lips 
into  acquaintance  with  pap  and  she  provides  the  dis- 
mal furniture  which  is  affixed  to  our  coffins.  In  her 
turn  Birmingham  lays  the  whole  world  under  contri- 
bution for  her  materials.  For  her  smiths  and  metal- 
workers and  jewelers,  wherever  nature  has  departed, 
stories  of  useful,  or  precious  metals,  or  as  hidden  glit- 
tering gems,  there  industrious  miners  are  busily  dig- 
ging. Divers  collect  for  her  button  makers  millions 
of  rare  and  costly  shells.  For  her  adventurous  hunt- 
ers rifle  the  buffalo  of  his  wide-spreading  horns,  and 
the  elephant  of  his  ivory  tusks.  There  is  scarcely  a 
product  of  any  country  or  any  climate  that  she  does 


BUSY  BIRMINGHAM.  179 

not  gladly  receive  and  in  return  stamps  with  a  richer 
value. 

The  people  of  Birmingham  are  said  to  be  pecu- 
liar in  their  strong  individuality  and  their  ardent  love 
for  and  loyalty  to  their  town.  They  are  well  supplied 
with  public  utilities,  including  a  very  large  library. 
The  city  is  well  governed  and  unlike  the  iron  workers 
of  many  other  cities,  are  orderly  and  easily  managed. 
Co-operation  and  profit-sharing  has  a  foothold  which 
almost  entirely  obviates  strikes  among  the  operatives. 

If  they  have  trouble  they  manage  to  settle  it  by 
arbitration  instead  of  giving  out  the  edict  "that  this 
will  be  a  fight  to  the  finish." 

In  the  suburbs  of  the  city  I  saw  where  hundreds  of 
acres  of  valuable  land  had  been  buried  under  slag  from 
the  furnaces,  from  ten  to  forty  feet  deep. 

Wolverhampton,  another  manufacturing  city 
along  our  railway,  a  few  years  ago,  fifteen  miles  from 
Birmingham,  is  now  a  suburb,  the  two  cities  being 
connected  by  industries  and  their  equipments.  The 
producing  and  consuming  power  of  their  population 
is  felt  at  many  an  American  hearthstone.  Although 
competitors  with  hundreds  of  American  industries, 
the  beef,  the  pork,  the  cheese,  flour,  etc.,  consumed, 
makes  glad  the  American  farmer. 

A  few  miles  further  on  brought  us  to  the  quaint 
old  city  of  Chester  with  40,000  inhabitants.  Chester 
is  the  oldest  town  in  England,  its  origin  dating  from 
about  the  beginning  of  the  Christian  era.  It  is  the 
county  seat  of  West  Cheshire,  situated  on  the  river 
Dee,  twenty  miles  from  the  open  sea,  sixteen  miles 


180  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

southeast  of  Liverpool  and  179  miles  northwest  of 
London  by  rail. 

The  city  was  founded  by  the  Romans  in  the  first 
century  and  was  walled  in  in  the  year  61.  The  long 
period  which  has  elapsed  since  the  organization  of  this 
ancient  city  has  witnessed  many  changes.  In  the 
early  centuries  it  was  the  battle  ground  for  the 
Britons,  Saxons  and  Danes.  It  was  taken,  re-taken, 
and  deserted  by  these  different  tribes. 

In  the  building  of  the  city  a  style  or  plan  was 
followed  differing  from  all  others  in  Britain,  or  in  fact 
in  the  known  world.  It  is  divided  into  four  principal 
blocks  by  the  four  principal  streets;  these  four  streets 
exhibit  in  what  are  called  "the  Rows"  a  characteris- 
tic feature  which  is  a  mystery.  These  rows  exist  on 
each  side  of  the  streets,  throughout  the  greater  part 
of  their  length  and  resemble  continuous  galleries 
open  to  the  street,  over  and  under  which  the  houses 
lining  these  streets  project,  and  which  are  formed,  as 
it  were,  out  of  the  front  first  floor  of  the  houses,  ap- 
proached by  flights  of  steps  from  the  roadway.  The 
Rows  are  flagged  or  boarded  under  foot,  and  sealed 
above,  thus  forming  a  covered  way  in  the  same  rela- 
tion to  the  shops,  which  are  at  their  back,  as  the  foot- 
pavement  does  in  other  towns. 

In  these  streets  are  examples  of  the  old  timbered 
houses  of  the  seventeenth  century,  giving  a  foreign 
character  to  the  town.  Relics  of  ancient  days  are 
found  in  a  stone  grimed  roof,  a  mortuary  chapel,  etc. 

The  celebrated  Grosvenor  bridge,  with  a  single 
span  of  stone  200  feet  in  length,  the  largest  in  the 
world  save  one,  crosses  the  Dee  on  the  southwest  of 


BUSY  BIRMINGHAM.  181 

the  city.  Caesar's  tower,  the  remains  of  a  castle  in 
the  upper  ward,  a  fine  old  cathedral,  Derby  house 
bearing  the  date  of  1591,  Bishop  Lloyd's  house,  God's 
Providence  house  and  the  Bear  and  Billet,  owing  to 
their  odd  architecture  should  not  be  missed  by  the 
tourist. 

The  wall  referred  to  around  the  city  has  been  re- 
newed several  times  since  »first  erected,  but  at  one 
point  there  remains  a  portion  of  the  original  structure. 
I  examined  the  brick  and  mortar,  which  at  the  expir- 
ation of  nearly  nineteen  hundred  years  seemed  in  a 
perfect  state  of  preservation.  The  present  wall  is 
eight  feet  thick  and  will  average  perhaps  twelve  feet 
high.  Our  guide  informed  me  that  the  original 
structure  was  erected  at  the  cost  of  a  penny  a  day  for 
the  labor.  This  scrap  of  history  may  not  be  strictly 
correct.  The  wall  is  about  two  miles  in  circumfer- 
ence and  the  fine  stone  walk  on  the  top,  with  the  views 
from  the  most  elevated  portions,  which  are  perhaps 
thirty  feet  high,  made  this  trip  around  the  city  a  pleas- 
ure. What  is  known  as  the  water  tower,  built  by  the 
Romans  in  the  first  century,  still  stands  just  outside 
the  wall,  although  bombarded  by  Cromwell  and  sur- 
rendered to  him  in  the  thirteenth  century. 

From  the  top  of  the  tower  the  hill  where  Crom- 
well's guns  were  located  is  in  plain  view,  and  a  few 
miles  beyond  in  the  distance  is  Hawarden,  for  many 
years  the  residence  of  the  renowned  Gladstone  and 
now  a  part  of  his  great  estate. 

Within  the  tower  were  many  antique  and  amusing 
relics ;  a  bishop's  chair  four  hundred  years  old,  a  bust 
of  a  sheep-thief  with  the  mark  of  the  rope  around  his 


182  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

neck  and  also  the  rope  which  choked  the  life  out  of 
him,  the  bust  being  made  from  a  picture  taken  after 
his  execution. 

Further  on  is  the  tower  on  the  top  of  which  King 
Charles  stood  and  witnessed  the  defeat  of  his  army, 
east  of  the  city  in  1645,  Lord  Byron  being  one  of  the 
king's  commanders. 

Should  a  rivalry  spring  up  in  Britain  between  the 
unique  old  cities  to  see  which  could  produce  the  most 
oddities,  the  largest  number  of  ancient  things  comi- 
cal, and  the  most  modern  eccentricities,  I  have  no 
doubt  that  the  city  of  Chester  would  win  the 
prize.  There  is  an  evident  repugnance  in  the  atmos- 
phere of  Chester  to  everything  modern  or  up-to-date, 
and  yet  there  is  an  air  of  satisfaction  in  the  faces  of  the 
people,  which  seems  to  have  reference  to  their  native 
town  as  well  as  themselves. 

The  markets  of  Chester  were  well  supplied  with 
everything  that  heart  could  wish.  The  meat  markets 
were  models  of  cleanliness  and  the  exhibition  of  their 
dainty  dressed  carcasses  was  a  source  of  pride  to  the 
butchers.  I  counted  fourteen  varieties  of  fish  hang- 
ing in  a  stall,  just  received  from  the  ocean,  which  were 
temptingly  fine  and  fresh. 

Leaving  Chester  not  without  a  little  feeling  of 
envy  for  its  comfortable,  self-satisfied  people,  we  pro- 
ceed to  Hollyhead,  eighty  miles  distant. 

This  little  city  in  Wales  is  located  on  St.  George's 
channel  or  the  Irish  sea,  at  the  far  end  of  a  narrow 
neck  of  land  offering  all  sorts  of  interest  and  amuse- 
ment. 

We  were  hardly  out  of  sight  of  either  extensive 


BUSY  BIRMINGHAM.  183 

fishing  industries,  operations  of  coal  miners,  great 
plants  where  thousands  of  iron  and  steel  workers  were 
employed  or  industries  of  less  capacity. 

We  passed  through  the  notorious  screw  bridge 
which  represents  a  wide  departure  in  bridge-building. 
At  Hollyhead  we  embarked  for  a  four  hours'  ride  to 
Dublin,,  and  with  gentle  breezes  and  smooth  seas  we 
landed  at  the  capital  of  Ireland. 


THE  IRISH  METROPOLIS  AND  HER 
LANDMARKS 


BIRTHPLACE  AND  RESTING  PLACE  OF  MEN  OP  GENIUS  AND 
WORLDWIDE  NOTORIETY— PARNELL  AND  HIS  FATAL  ESCA- 
PADE. 


Dublin,  the  capital  and  metropolis  of  Ireland,  is  a 
city  of  more  than  400,000  inhabitants.  Its  well-paved 
streets  and  substantial  business  blocks  give  the  city 
an  appearance  of  permanence,  and  thrift.  There  are, 
however,  many  sudden  transitions  from  magnificence 
to  meanness  in  the  residence  portions.  On  some  of 
the  leading  streets  may  be  found  colossal  old  homes 
in  the  midst  of  luxurious  surroundings,  but  within  a 
stones-throw  a  contrast  most  displeasing.  Dublin 
has  many  public  edifices  of  large  and  stately  propor- 
tions. The  bank  of  Ireland,  formerly  the  house  of 
parliament,  occupying  five  acres,  is  very  imposing. 
Trinity  college  is  a  massive  structure,  well  propor- 
tioned, and  a  source  of  pride  to  all  Ireland.  It  con- 
tains a  great  library  and  portraits  of  many  famous 
Irishmen,  including  Gratten,  Yelverton,  Lord  Ross, 
Lord  Killwarden  and  others.  Dublin  cas'tle,  as 
appearances  go,  has  little  to  recommend  it.  Built 
principally  of  brick,  it  is  dingy,  dirty  and  bordering  on 
dilapidation.  It  has  a  handsome  tower  and  chapel 
and  manages  to  occupy  ten  acres  of  ground.  The 
custom  house,  the  greatest  ornament  of  the  city,  was 
erected  in  1790  at  a  cost  of  $2,000,000.  Its  three 
granite  fronts,  rising  to  a  height  of  125  feet,  give  the 

184 


THE  IRISH  METROPOLIS.  185 

building  a  lofty  and  commanding  appearance.  And 
then  there  are  the  four  courts,  the  city  hall,  and  the 
postoffice,  making  up  a  creditable  set  of  public  edi- 
fices. St.  Patrick's  Cathedral,  Christ's  church  and  a 
few  other  church  edifices  are  models  of  beauty,  but  of 
the  very  large  number  of  houses  of  worship  within  the 
city,  a  majority  are  lacking  in  size  and  fine  finish. 
They  are  mostly  old  and  in  the  poor  localities. 

The  Dublin  museum,  filled  with  a  collection  of 
Irish  relics  and  curiosities,  prehistoric  and  otherwise, 
should  not  be  missed  by  the  American  tourist.  What- 
ever your  impressions  of  Ireland  may  be  when  you 
enter,  you  will  leave  with  a  feeling  that  the  old  king- 
dom has  histories  making  it  one  of  the  most  interest- 
ing spots  on  the  globe.  The  collection  of  skeletons 
of  reptiles,  animals  and  birds  is  worth  a  trip  to  Ireland 
to  see  and  study.  Great  lizards  poking  their  bony 
noses  fifteen  to  twenty  feet  into  the  air.  Skeletons  of 
Irish  deer  standing  not  less  than  eight  feet  high  with 
antlers  reaching  more  than  eleven  feet  from  tip  to  tip, 
and  weighing  not  less  than  1,400  pounds  when  alive, 
are  numbered  among  the  things  prehistoric. 

Dublin  is  well  supplied  with  parks  and  fountains. 
Her  Phoenix  park,  seven  miles  in  circumference,  con- 
taining nearly  2,000  acres,  partly  within  the  city  limits, 
is  one  of  the  finest  in  all  Europe.  Its  beautiful  land- 
scapes, its  monuments  and  its  profusion  of  flowers 
and  ornamental  shrubbery  makes  this  park  an  easy 
rival  of  the  Tuilleries  of  Paris  and  St.  James  of  Lon- 
don. Its  monument  to  Lord  Cavendish,  near  the 
center  of  the  park,  erected  on  the  spot  where  the  lord 
and  his  private  secretary  were  assassinated  a  few  years 


186  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

since,  was  an  unpleasant  reminder  of  an  event  full  of 
consternation  to  the  landlords  and  government  offi- 
cials. Lord  Cavendish  was  unfortunate  in  being  a 
leader  in  causing  evictions  to  be  pushed  for  non-pay- 
ment of  rents.  High  rents  and  inability  to  pay  had 
driven  tenants  to  a  state  of  frenzy  and  a  crisis  was 
imminent.  The  assassination  of  these  two  men 
wrought  a  climax  and  a  discussion  in  parliament  of 
the  causes  leading  up  to  the  crime  ended  in  a  modifi- 
cation of  prices  by  the  landlords,  and  less  arbitrary 
methods  for  the  collection  of  the  same. 

The  early  history  of  Dublin  consists  mainly  of 
legends.  There  is  nothing  reliable  in  regard  to  its 
organization.  There  are  records  of  its  being  at  war 
with  the  people  of  Leinster,  the  province  in  which 
Dublin  is  located,  in  the  year  291,  and  that  Christian- 
ity was  introduced  by  St.  Patrick  in  the  year  450. 

In  the  ninth  century  the  city  was  attacked  by  the 
Danes,  later  the  Danes  were  driven  out  by  the  Irish 
and  for  a  period  of  800  years  there  were  wars  galore, 
in  which  the  Normans,  the  English  and  the  Scotch 
in  turn  took  a  hand.  In  the  sixteenth  and  seven- 
teenth centuries  there  seemed  to  have  been  growth 
and  prosperity  in  Dublin  and  throughout  the  Irish 
kingdom  as  well.  Ireland  became,  in  those  days, 
prominent  as  an  industrial  mart,  but  bickerings,  in- 
ternal strife,  and  clashing  in  home  government  ended 
in  1801  in  union  with  Great  Britain,  or  in  other  words 
whatever  Ireland  possessed  of  independence  was 
merged  into  the  government  of  Great  Britain.  In- 
stead of  this  union  ending  her  troubles  a  new  field  of 
misfortune,  misadventure  and  misery  was  opened  to 


THE  IRISH  METROPOLIS.  187 

her  people.  During  nearly  the  entire  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, between  the  English  government  and  her  Irish 
subjects  friction  and  inharmony  have  been  the  rule. 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  discuss  Irish  grievances  or 
the  effect  of  this  union  of  interests,  but  I  will  simply 
say — that  while  the  effect  of  the  union  has  not  fulfilled 
the  expectations  of  the  British  government ,  it  has  been 
disastrous  to  the  Irish  kingdom.  It  has  been  a  house 
divided  against  itself.  During  the  last  century  Eng- 
land and  Scotland,  from  commercial,  industrial  and 
maritime  standpoints,  forged  ahead  by  leaps  and 
bounds,  while  Ireland  not  only  failed  to  make  progress 
along  these  lines,  but  the  end  of  the  century  showed  a 
decided  loss  from  the  beginning.  Irish  agitation  in 
the  houses  of  parliament  has  familiarized  the  world 
with  the  nature  of  these  troubles.  The  efforts  of  the 
late  Premier  W.  E.  Gladstone,  and  the  late  Irish  liber- 
ator Charles  Parnell,  were  not  barren  of  results, 
although  they  failed  to  fully  accomplish  the  ends 
sought.  How,  or  when  the  nut  of  Irish  liberty  is  to 
be  cracked  and  the  enjoyment  of  the  rights  and  privi- 
leges hoped  for  by  the  rank  and  file  of  that  country, 
is  a  question  that  cannot  be  answered.  With  the 
small  Irish  representation  in  parliament  to  me  the 
prospects  of  any  radical  change  for  the  better  in  the 
treatment  of  Irish  subjects  is  not  flattering.  So- 
called  Irish  liberty  I  can  but  regard  as  a  delusive 
phantom,  a  dream  not  soon  to  be  realized. 

Our  party  was  driven  out  to  the  main  cemetery 
of  Dublin  where  rests  the  remains  of  the  most  famous 
of  Ireland's  loyal  sons.  The  monument  to  Daniel 
O'Connell  reaches  the  farthest  towards  the  heavens 


188  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

and  is  the  most  elaborate  in  its  construction.  That  of 
Charles  Parnell  comes  next ;  there  were  many  others 
less  imposing.  There  was  Burke,  a  native  of  Dublin, 
whose  eloquence  for  thirty  years  thrilled  the  houses  of 
parliament,  and  whose  oratory  was  matchless  in  the 
world's  history.  And  then  there  were  monuments  to 
Sheridan,  and  Phillips,  and  Curran,  and  Grattan, 
Boyle,  Malone,  Flood,  Perry,  Daly,  Bergh,  and  hosts 
of  others  who  achieved  fame  and  distinction  in  their 
day. 

With  the  biography  of  Parnell  there  is  a  tinge  of 
sadness  which  Irishmen  would  gladly  forget.  He 
was  a  young  man  of  brilliant  attainments,  distin- 
guished for  both  courage  and  ability.  He  early  be- 
came a  champion  of  Irish  liberty  and  reform,  and  to 
him  was  pinned  the  faith  and  hopes  of  5,000,000 
people. 

Our  driver  pointed  out  a  large  hall  within  sight 
of  the  monument  reared  to  the  memory  of  Parnell  and 
with  the  remark,  "I  have  heard  him  speak  in  this  hall 
many  a  night  when  the  place  would  not  hold  one- 
half  the  people  that  wanted  to  get  in.  They  filled  the 
yard  around  the  building  and  the  road  besides,  hoping 
to  catch  a  few  words  of  his  eloquence." 

When  I  asked  about  his  popularity,  he  said : 
"Why,  sir,  the  people  worshipped  him,  he  was  their 
idol,  but  the  poor  man  by  one  fatal  mistake  lost  his 
hold  upon  the  masses,  and  died  prematurely  of  a 
broken  heart."  Ireland  may  well  take  pride  in  her 
orators  and  their  loyalty  for  centuries,  to  her  vital  in- 
terests. If  brilliant  efforts  in  the  halls  of  legislation 
could  have  secured  to  her  the  rights  which  she  claims, 
her  troubles  would  long  ago  have  been  settled. 


THE  IRISH  METROPOLIS.  189 

Few  if  any  countries  with  similar  population  have 
been  able  to  show  such  an  array  of  talent  as  has 
distinguished  Ireland  during  the  last  ten  centuries. 
She  has  little  to  console  her  for  this  seeming  waste 
of  distinguished  effort. 

Ireland  seemed  to  have  been  created  in  the  prodi- 
gality of  nature.  Bountiful  harvests  gathered  in 
something  over  half  of  her  territory  for  a  time  sup- 
ported more  than  8,000,000  people.  With  less  than 
half  the  arable  land  in  Ohio,  twice  our  population 
were  able  sixty  years  ago  to  make  a  living.  But 
calamity  has  succeeded  calamity  until  8,000,000 
people  have  been  reduced  to  5,000,000.  First  the  in- 
troduction of  the  potato  in  1610  proved  a  dangerous 
proposition.  From  one-third  to  one-half  the  people 
depended  upon  it  for  a  living.  With  the  bountiful 
crops  of  the  dangerous  tuber  populations  multiplied. 
There  was  little  frost  in  Ireland  and  for  a  long  time 
no  thought  of  storing  the  potato  for  future  use. 
Finally  a  cold  freezing  winter  destroyed  the  crop  and 
starvation  swept  the  people  away  by  thousands.  Next 
the  potato  blight  in  1837  brought  on  a  disastrous 
famine,  and  later  its  complete  destruction  by  rot  in 
1847  resulted  in  starvation  of  between  two  and  three 
hundred  thousand  people. 

Up  to  that  date  agriculture  in  Ireland  was  con- 
fined almost  exclusively  to  the  production  of  potatoes 
and  grass  which  was  utilized  in  raising  cattle  and 
sheep. 

The  famine  of  1847  tended  to  stimulate  diversified 
agriculture,  and  with  the  exception  of  Indian  corn, 
Irish  farmers  are  today  following  almost  the  identical 


190  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

lines  in  crop  production  being  followed  by  the  farmers 
of  Ohio. 

That  the  cities  of  Ireland  should  be  prolific  of 
crime  is  not  marvelous.  With  the  lack  of  industries 
furnishing  employment,  low  wages,  high  rents  and 
high  taxes,  the  poor  classes  become  disheartened  and 
discouraged.  The  system  of  municipal  government  is 
usually  arbitrary  and  tempered  with  little  mercy  The 
argument  of  the  violators  is  that  they  are  sinned 
against.  The  masses  charge  England  with  stripping 
the  mother  of  capital,  taking  their  bread  and  giving 
them  a  stone  in  return.  They  charge  that  the  policy 
of  the  English  government  has  produced  annihilation 
and  given  them  a  deluge  of  debt  instead.  True  or 
untrue  to  the  Irish  peasant,  or  to  the  middle  and  lower 
classes,  this  arraignment  of  their  government  of  last 
resort  is  regarded  by  them  as  being  founded  upon 
facts. 

From  Dublin  to  Killarney,  185  miles  through  the 
central  portion  of  Ireland,  was  a  revelation  to  the 
tourists  who  had  previously  associated  Ireland  with 
poverty  and  destitution.  The  deep  fertility  of  the  soil 
and  the  bountiful  crops  the  most  of  this  distance,  dis- 
pelled all  thoughts  of  scarcity.  The  yields  of  wheat, 
hay  and  oats  and  root  crops  were  immense. 

Methods  of  cultivation  could  be  compared  with 
ours  of  fifty  years  ago.t  The  use  of  sickles,  cradles  and 
scythes  were  everywhere  present  with  an  occasional 
reaper  and  mowing  machine. 

The  frequent  rains  in  Ireland  and  the  entire  free- 
dom from  drouth  keeps  all  vegetation  fresh  and  makes 
the  rich  emerald  green  of  the  forests  and  fields  a  con- 


THE  IRISH  METROPOLIS.  191 

stant  delight.  The  most  luxuriant  pastures  that  I 
saw  in  Europe  were  along  the  road  to  Killarney,  and 
such  cattle  one  does  not  see  in  such  numbers  in 
America.  Thousands  of  thoroughbred  short-horns, 
every  one  fit  for  a  show  animal,  were  being  raised 
and  finished  for  the  Liverpool  and  London  markets. 
The  breeding  and  feeding  of  mutton-sheep  is  being 
pursued  with  the  same  painstaking.  Not  an  inferior 
animal,  not  a  scrub  being  tolerated. 

The  country  along  the  way,  although  productive 
beyond  calculation,  presented  a  lonely  and  often  deso- 
late appearance.  The  fences  are  nearly  all  moss-cov- 
ered stone  walls,  and  the  houses  are  generally  small, 
old  and  uninviting.  Flowers  and  shrubbery  around 
the  dwellings  «were  the  exception  instead  of  the  rule. 
The  excuse  being  that  ornamentation  and  improve- 
ments would  mean  an  increase  in  the  rents. 

Like  the  English,  the  Irish  farmer  depends  upon 
stacking  his  grain  and  hay,  there  being  no  barns. 

Incidentally,  while  Ireland  possesses  some  of  the 
richest  land  in  all  Europe  it  is  her  misfortune  to  have 
some  of  the  poorest. 


KILLARNEY,     ITS     SCENERY     AND 
SURROUNDINGS 


BEAUTY  OF  THE  LAKES— THE  ROAD  TO  BANTRY  BAY— HOPELESS 
POVERTY  OF  COUNTRY  AND  PEOPLE— FROM  CORK  TO  BEL- 
FAST. 


Killarney  is  an  old  market  town  with  a  population 
of  about  6,000.  It  is  located  on  a  branch  of  the  Cork 
railway  in  the  county  of  Kerry.  Formerly  Killarney 
was  made  prosperous  by  a  variety  of  manufacturing 
industries  which  have  became  obsolete.  These  in- 
cluded an  iron  smelting  works,  the  roof  of  which  has 
fallen  in.  Fancy  articles  made  from  the  wood  of 
the  arbutus  and  the  fisheries  are  the  only  enterprises 
of  importance  employing  labor.  The  fine  scenery  in 
the  neighborhood  attracts  thousands  of  visitors  from 
abroad  and  their  money  has  latterly  given  an  impetus 
to  the  ancient  city,  which  is  claimed  to  be  greatly  im- 
proved in  appearance.  The  court  house,  cathedral, 
the  bishop's  palace,  and  the  railway  hotel  are  the  lead- 
ing public  buildings.  Out  in  the  suburbs  is  a  lunatic 
asylum,  which  was  erected  at  a  cost  of  $150,000.  The 
mansion  of  the  earl  of  Kenmare  also  is  located  not  far 
away.  The  principal  street  of  the  city  has  business 
places  and  residences  located  alternately.  It  is  often 
less  than  one  short  step  from  splendor  to  squalor. 

The  architecture  of  the  old  part  of  the  town  can- 
not fail  to  interest  all  Americans.  Brick  houses  with 
more  brick  in  the  chimneys  than  in  the  side-walls,  and 
their  steep  roofs  frequently  coming  down  within  easy 
m 


KILLARNEY  AND  SURROUNDINGS.  193 

reach  from  the  sidewalk  are  frequent.  In  entering 
the  first  story  of  these  houses  you  usually  take  two  or 
three  steps  down,  and  to  reach  the  second  story  two 
or  three  steps  up.  The  streets  are  usually  well  paved, 
and  the  business  places  largely  devoted  to  the  drink 
habit.  The  sale  of  Irish  and  Scotch  whiskies  indica- 
ted that  the  total  abstinence  societies  formed  by 
Father  Mathew,  sixty  years  ago,  are  not  flourishing. 

It  may  be  interesting  to  know  that  Father  Mathew, 
the  greatest  of  all  temperance  reformers,  was  born  in 
Limerick,  but  a  few  miles  from  Killarney.  In  Gal- 
way,  Dublin  and  other  leading  cities  he  secured  total 
abstinence  pledges  often  at  the  rate  of  twenty  thou- 
sand a  day,  reaching  in  the  aggregate  hundreds  of 
thousands.  Old  residents  will  remember  his  visit  to 
America,  and  his  two  years  of  temperance  work  from 
1849  to  1851. 

The  market  street  of  Killarney  was  generally 
occupied  with  donkeys  and  carts  in  charge  of  women 
and  loaded  with  such  commodities  as  the  country 
affords. 

The  scenery  in  the  neighborhood  of  this  old  city 
is  one  of  the  leading  attractions  of  Ireland.  Poets 
have  made  the  lakes  of  Killarney  famous.  I  walked 
out  to  Ross  castle,  an  ancient  ruin  two  miles  from  the 
city.  On  each  side  of  the  highway  the  most  of  the 
distance  were  high  stone  walls  mossy  gray  with 
age.  The  street  was  shaded  with  trees  that  were  ever 
green  and  their  foliage  mingled  with  the  shrubbery 
and  roses  of  wild  varieties  made  a  scene  that  was 
enchanting.  There  were  wild  fuchias  at  least  twelve 
feet  high  loaded  with  blossoms.  I  was  informed  that 


194  GLIMPSES  OF  EUROPE. 

the  land,  which  is  very  rich  along  that  road,  rents 
for  six  Ibs.  an  acre,  or  thirty  dollars  of  our  money.  In 
front  of  Ross  castle  lies  the  lake  of  Loch  Leane  cover- 
ing five  thousand  acres.  This  is  one  of  a  series  of  the 
lakes  of  Killarney,  situated  in  a  basin  between  lofty 
mountain  groups  which  rise  abruptly  from  the  waters' 
edge,  and  are  clothed  with  a  thick  mass  of  trees  and 
shrubbery.  Loch  Leane  is  studded  with  some  finely 
wooded  islands  which  add  largely  to  its  attraction. 

I  bargained  with  a  venerable  son  of  Erin  for  a  ride 
on  the  lake,  and  was  landed  on  the  island  of  Inisfallen 
which  Thomas  Moore  so  fittingly  describes  in  his 
"Sweet  Inisfallen."  He  says: 

Sweet  Inisfallen,  fare  thee  well, 

May  calm  and  sunshine  long  be  thine : 

How  fair  thou  art  let  others  tell, — 

To  feel  how  fair  shall  long  be  mine. 
******* 

Weeping  or  smiling  lonely  isle ; 
And  all  the  lovelier  for  thy  tears — 
For  tho'  but  rare  thy  sunny  smile 
'Tis  heaven's  own  glance  when  it  appears. 
Like  feeling  hearts  whose  joys  are  few, 
But  when  indeed  they  come,  divine. 
The  brightest  light  the  sun  ere  threw 
Is  lifeless  to  one  gleam  of  thine. 

On  this  island  of  twenty-one  acres  are  the  pictur- 
esque ruins  of  an  abbey  founded  by  St  Finian  in  the 
sixth  century.  In  addition  to  this  ancient  fortress 
were  the  ruins  of  an  alleged  college  and  also  a  reform- 
atory. My  simple  minded  gondolier  was  a  faithful 
type  of  a  class  of  guides  in  Europe  whose  fertile  imag- 
inations supply  whatever  is  lacking  in  history, 


KILLARNEY  AND  SURROUNDINGS.  195 

legendry  or  mythology.  He  pointed  out  the  grave 
of  St.  Finian,  told  of  his  brilliant  career,  of  his  making 
this  island  the  refuge  of  the  monied  classes.  Of  the 
treasure  which  was  buried  there,  during  the  sixth 
century  by  the  monks  having  it  in  charge.  He  told 
tales  of  the  grajid  hunt  for  these  buried  millions  which 
had  been  kept  up  from  century  to  century,  and  with 
apparent  sincerity  and  emphasis  insisted  "that  the 
money  is  still  here,  sir." 

A  flock  of  well-developed  black-nosed  sheep  were 
being  fattened  upon  the  shamrock  which  covered  the 
surface  of  this  island.  Shamrock,  as  every  one  knows, 
is  the  emblem  of  Ireland.  It  is  a  first  cousin  of 
white  clover  and  is  one  of  the  sweetest  of  all  grasses. 
My  new  found  friend  cut  a  piece  of  sod  from  the 
mound  supposed  to  cover  the  grave  of  St.  Finian, 
requested  me  to  take  it  home  and  raise  shamrock  of 
my  own.  I  followed  his  instructions,  but  like  St.  Fin- 
ian, the  shamrock  died.  Thomas  Moore  never  found 
a  more  charming  spot  to  write  about.  Added  to  the 
scenery  of  this  island  are  the  fringes  of  the  lake  and 
the  blue  sparkling  water,  said  to  be  three  hundred  feet 
deep  in  places,  with  here  and  there  a  ruined  castle  in 
the  distance.  Cottages  of  the  well-to-do  people 
around  the  edges  of  the  water,  also  the  fine  old  resi- 
dence of  Daniel  O'Connell,  the  great  Irish  liberator, 
located  on  the  spot  where  he  was  born,  added  to  the 
fascination. 

When  about  to  return  to  Killarney  I  requested 
my  guide  to  take  an  air  line  route  instead  of  going  by 
Ross  castle.  Where  I  landed  the  bushes  were  thick 
and  high,  and  to  my  request  to  point  out  the  way — 


196  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

with  that  rich  Irish  brogue  which  had  never  been 
contaminated,  or  modified  by  nasal  twang,  he  said, 
"You  go  an  for  three  hundred  yards,  then  turn  to 
your  right  and  go  an  till  you  meet  two  bridges,  and 
when  they  pass  you,  you  will  be  in  the  town."  I  met 
the  bridges  and  reached  the  town. 

From  Killarney  to  Bantry  Bay,  a  distance  of  fifty 
miles,  our  party  proceeded  by  stage  coach.  A  mili- 
tary road  made  by  the  government  made  the  trip 
feasible  which  would  otherwise  have  been  nearly  or 
quite  impossible,  as  mountains  and  high  hills  were  the 
rule.  Ireland  is  frequently  spoken  of  as  being  the  best 
and  poorest  country  on  the  globe.  Along  this  route 
we  found  verification  of  the  poor  end  of  this  theory. 
Usually  mountains  mingle  with  rich  valleys,  not  so 
in  this  case,  the  valleys  seem  to  have  been  quick-sand, 
springy,  and  almost  destitute  of  fertility.  For  at 
least  thirty  miles  of  this  distance  the  poverty  of  the  soil 
was  only  exceeded  by  the  poverty  of  the  inhabitants. 
For  centuries,  apparently,  that  country  has  been 
inhabited,  but  how  the  people  managed  to  live  is  not 
readily  comprehended. 

A  typical  house  is  a  hut,  say  twelve  feet  square, 
one  story,  a  four-lighted  window  on  each  side.  No 
floors  nor  partitions.  I  managed  to  get  inside  of  one 
of  them.  It  was  a  step  down  from  the  common  level. 
The  earth  answering  the  purpose  of  a  floor  was  not 
level.  A  pile  of  straw  in  one  corner  served  the 
purpose  of  beds.  A  few  boulders  in  one  end  were  a 
substitute  for  a  fire-place.  A  crane,  some  hooks,  a 
pot,  and  a  kettle  constituted  the  outfit  for  cooking. 
There  was  a  hole  in  the  roof  from  which  the  smoke 


KILLARNEY  AND  SURROUNDINGS.  197 

was  expected  to  escape,  but  the  smoke  from  the  burn- 
ing peat  did  not  seem  to  take  the  hint,  and  curled 
away  in  other  directions,  making  the  hut  as  blue  as 
the  few  dishes  which  made  up  the  stock  of  crockery. 
The  furniture,  aside  from  two  or  three  dry  goods 
boxes  and  a  bench,  consisted  of  a  table  made  of  rough 
boards,  and  this  place — by  a  man,  his  wife  and  several 
children  was  called  home.  Like  scores  of  others  of 
the  same  class  it  seemed  to  have  been  occupied  for 
many  years.  The  property  of  these  peasants — if  they 
have  anything  besides  the  hovel,  consists  of  chickens, 
ducks,  geese  and  pigs,  all  asserting  their  right  to  enter 
the  parlor.  Sometimes  a  little  black  Kerry  cow,  a 
goat  or  two,  and  a  lop-eared  donkey,  finds  a  home  in 
a  room  attached  to  the  residence. 

These  little  thatched  huts  are  often  in  groups  of 
ten  to  twenty,  making  a  little  hamlet.  This  is  near 
where  the  peat  beds  are  located  which  furnish  an 
occasional  day's  work. 

If  these  poverty  stricken  peasants  ever  have  an 
enterprising  impulse  they  have  no  capital  to  give  it 
shape  or  direction.  With  fish,  and  a  few  vegetables 
raised  among  the  rocks,  and  the  money  earned  in  the 
better  portions  of  Ireland  and  England  during  harvest 
time,  they  manage  to  subsist  and  pay  the  rents  de- 
manded by  the  landlords.  The  most  of  the  children 
in  these  poorest  localities  are  trained  beggars.  Scat- 
tered along  beside  the  highway  these  little  victims  of 
unfortunate  environments  were  making  appeals  for  a 
penny.  Clothed  in  but  a  single  garment,  their  bright 
eyes,  their  faces  unwashed  and  their  hair  uncombed, 
made  a  spectacle  calculated  to  touch  every  heart 


198  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE, 

which  is  not  calloused.  Their  young  lives  are  not 
sweetened  by  any  pleasant  recollections,  present  sur- 
roundings or  hopes  for  the  future.  And  then  the 
women  lugging  peat  for  miles  in  baskets  strapped  to 
their  backs  added  another  phase  to  the  abject  poverty 
and  degradation  everywhere  present. 

Every  tourist  wonders  why  these  people  are  there. 
Why  the  government  does  not  furnish  them  some 
relief  which  will  take  them  away  to  a  country  fit  for 
habitation.  It  is,  however,  a  notorious  fact  that  from 
localities,  but  little  better  than  I  describe,  have  come 
to  America  thousands  of  young  women  and  young 
men  who  have  made  themselves  useful,  have  made 
thrifty  and  progressive  residents,  and  by  their  indus- 
try have  accumulated  and  secured  good  homes. 
America  is  the  goal  for  these  peasants,  and  in  the 
western  and  southern  portions  of  Ireland  a  large 
majority  of  the  families  have  an  American  contingent. 

We  stayed  over  night  at  Glengariff,  an  oasis  in  this 
desert  of  destitution. 

The  soil  in  that  locality  is  fertile,  and  the  scenery 
and  flowers  beautiful.  The  singing  of  thousands  of 
birds  furnished  a  charm  not  often  found  in  America, 
where  inhuman  bird  destruction  is  tolerated.  On  ten 
miles  to  Bantry  Bay,  a  little  seaport  town  emphasizing 
the  poverty  and  squalor  of  that  country,  we  saw  an- 
chored Sir  Thomas  Lipton's  Shamrock  No.  1,  that  all 
the  world  knows  about.  Lipton,  with  his  450  stores, 
a  resident  of  the  north  of  Ireland,  is  said. to  be  the 
greatest  of  the  merchants  of  Europe. 

A  few  hours  from  Bantry,  through  a  much  better 
country,  landed  us  in  Cork,  one  of  the  oldest  Irish 


KILLARNEY  AND  SURROUNDINGS.  199 

cities,  with  a  population  of  about  100,000.  Cork  has 
long  been  a  manufacturing  town  of  importance,  and 
in  spite  of  the  reverses  and  drawbacks  encountered  by 
Ireland,  she  has  managed  to  maintain  a  good  deal  of 
her  prestige.  The  city  has  many  fine  public  improve- 
ments by  way  of  railways,  tramways,  pavements,  etc. 
Some  of  her  primitive  customs  are  retained.  At  the 
leading  hotel  where  we  stopped  I  was  shown  to  bed 
with  a  tallow  candle.  This  same  thing  occurred  in 
five  of  the  six  hotels  of  Ireland  where  we  were  enter- 
tained, and  they  were  all  the  best  houses  obtainable. 

Our  party  took  in  Blarney  castle  a  few  miles  from 
Cork.  Few  tourists  miss  this  ancient  humbug,  but  it 
wasn't  possible  to  muster  courage  enough  in  our 
group  to  make  the  attempt  to  kiss  the  Blarney  stone. 
This  is  a  hazardous  undertaking  as  it  involves  the 
danger  of  falling  seventy  feet  to  the  ground.  The 
castle  is  a  huge  old  affair  which  for  a  long  time  re- 
sisted the  guns  of  Oliver  Cromwell. 

Back  to  Dublin  for  a  few  hours  and  on  to  Belfast 
made  a  long  day's  ride,  compassing  nearly  the  entire 
length  of  the  Irish  kingdom.  Too  much  cannot  be 
said  in  praise  of  Belfast,  or  in  fact  of  the  most  of  the 
north  of  Ireland.  Nature's  endowments  of  that  part 
of  the  country  were  generously  supplied  and  the  enter- 
prise of  her  people  which  has  been  going  on  for  cen- 
turies has  given  the  landscape  a  finished  appearance. 
Fine  residences  scattered  thro'  the  country,  high  cul- 
tivation, great  crops  and  substantial  improvements 
characterizes  the  work  of  the  farmers.  The  cities  and 
small  towns  along  the  way  all  seem  prosperous. 

Drogheda  on  the   Boyne,   the  birth   place   and 


200  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

former  home  of  many  residents  of  this  county,  was 
one  of  the  most  substantial  looking  places  seen  in  my 
travels.  Down  on  the  river  where  the  famous  battle 
of  the  Boyne  was  fought,  are  immense  stock  yards 
where  cattle  dealers  were  .busy  with  their  trading. 

Belfast,  a  city  of  300,000  people,  is  the  leading 
manufacturing  city  of  Ireland,  and  is  up-to-date  in  all 
respects.  Its  public  buildings  and  business  places  are 
fine.  Belfast  has  long  been  the  seat  of  the  linen 
industry  of  the  world,  and  her  goods  continue  to  sus- 
tain the  prestige  earned  by  the  manufacture  of  fine 
qualities.  Some  of  her  merchants  complained  bit- 
terly of  American  competition  and  American  prices. 
They  pronounced  our  goods  inferior  to  theirs,  but  to 
successfully  compete  with  American  prices  it  was  nec- 
essary to  show  buyers  the  difference,  and  to  sell  at 
prices  which  they  could  not  afford.  In  forty  years 
Belfast  has  come  up  to  her  present  proportions  from 
a  city  of  about  40,000  inhabitants.  Her  ship  building 
interests  are  immense,  and  her  keen,  far-sighted  busi- 
ness men  are  as  enterprising  and  progressive  as  can 
be  found  in  any  city  of  Europe. 


GIANTS'  CAUSEWAY 


LONDONDERRY— ADIEU  TO  EUROPE— TO  KNOW  MUST   BE  SEEN- 
AMERICAN  GREATNESS— STORM  AT  SEA. 


From  Belfast  to  Giants'  Causeway  through  the 
little  city  of  Port  Rush  was  a  ride  of  about  four  hours, 
the  most  of  the  way  by  steam  road.  The  last  nine 
miles  by  an  electric  motor.  Every  school  boy  of  the 
old  days  will  remember  the  pictures  in  his  geography 
of  the  Giants'  Causeway,  and  how  he  associated  the 
rocks  with  giants,  and  wondered  what  their  relations 
to  the  Causeway  really  were.  This  unique  pier  is  a 
geological  mystery.  By  what  process  100,000  or 
more  pillars  were  wrought  out,  or  molded  and 
mechanically  placed  in  position  with  exactness  is  an 
enigma  that  will  never  be  fully  solved.  Our  party 
engaged  a  guide,  an  old  timer,  who  would  have  us 
believe  that  it  was  the  work  of  a  race  of  real  giants, 
but  he  failed  to  awaken  any  of  our  credulity.  There  is 
a  legend,  however,  that  it  was  the  beginning  of  a  road 
to  be  constructed  by  giants  across  the  channel  to 
Scotland.  Our  guide  took  us  in  a  row-boat  out  into 
the  foaming  surf,  rowed  us  into  a  great  cave  where 
echoes  were  even  more  interesting  than  stalactites. 
Where  the  report  of  a  gun  in  the  hands  of  a  gentle- 
man laying  for  a  tip  was  repeated  and  reverberated 
beyond  all  calculation.  We  were  finally  landed  on  a 
collection  of  about  40,000  pillars,  and  our  guide  in- 
formed us  that  no  two  of  them  were  alike,  or  of  the 

201 


202  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

same  shape.  In  circumference  they  ranged  from  45 
to  60  inches.  None  of  them  were  square.  They  were 
all  standing  erect,  and  varying  in  height  from  six  feet 
to  twenty  feet.  The  longest  ones  were  in  sections, 
and  where  the  ends  came  together  were  without  ex- 
ception either  convex  or  concave,  and  fitted  together 
with  such  skill  as  would  be  shown  by  an  expert 
mechanic.  The  same  skill  was  manifest  in  the  relation 
of  the  pillars  to  each  other.  The  rock  is  all  basaltic, 
and  nearly  as  hard  as  granite.  Projecting  from  the 
high  banks  along  the  shore  were  pillars  of  a  similar 
character  in  a  horizontal  position,  suggestive  in  their 
form  of  the  pipes  in  a  great  church  organ. 

On  to  Londonderry,  a  city  of  40,000  inhabitants 
located  on  the  river  Foyle  80  miles  northwest  of  Bel- 
fast. The  Foyle  is  navigable  for  large  boats,  and  is 
crossed  at  "Deny"  by  an  iron  bridge  1,200  feet  in 
length.  The  city  is  mostly  upon  edge,  and  its  ancient 
portion  is  still  surrounded  with  a  rampart  a  mile  in 
circumference,  having  seven  gates.  There  are  two 
cathedrals,  and  the  abbey  of  Temple  More,  or  Great 
church  erected  in  1174  before  its  destruction  by  the 
Normans  was  one  of  the  finest  buildings  in  Ireland. 
It  was  destroyed  in  the  year  1600.  The  public  build- 
ings of  the  city  are  creditable.  Some  of  the  antique 
residences  with  high  pyramidal  gables  still  exist,  but 
they  are  being  modernized.  There  are  a  large  number 
of  manufactories  of  various  kinds  in  Derry,  but  linen 
leads  all  others.  All  the  stores,  both  wholesale  and 
retail,  carry  a  generous  supply,  and  prices  show  the 
effect  of  keen  competition.  A  little,  aged,  stooped- 
shouldered  daughter  of  Erin  located  on  the  bridge 


GIANTS'  CAUSEWAY.  203 

where  she  followed  the  occupation  of  fruit-seller,  is 
credited  with  a  sample  of  genuine  Irish  repartee. 
Being  approached  by  a  man  from  Kansas  whose  con- 
ceit, or  desire  to  be  smart  (which  often  overtakes  men 
away  from  home)  with  the  remark,  "I  suppose  you 
think  those  water  melons  of  yours  are  large,  but  we 
have  apples  in  Kansas  that  will  beat  them  for  size." 
Her  quick  reply  was,  "go  long  wid  yees ;  I  don't  want 
to  be  bothered  with  a  man  that  don't  know  water 
melons  from  gooseberries." 

And  this  ends  an  interesting  week  in  Ireland,  a 
country  that  from  childhood  I  had  cherished  an  in- 
tense desire  to  visit.  Knowing  a  good  deal,  as  I  have, 
of  Irish  character,  their  generosity,  their  lasting 
friendships  and  their  certainty  to  remember  every 
kind  act,  made  a  visit  to  the  land  of  their  birth  doubly 
entertaining.  And  now  my  account  of  things  seen  in 
Europe  is  at  an  end. 

What  I  have  said  in  this  volume  has  been 
mainly  from  a  memory  upon  which  three  months' 
travel  made  deep,  and  lasting  impressions.  I  have 
aimed  to  give  the  reader  as  truthful  and  faithful 
an  account  of  what  I  saw  as  possible,  but,  like  all 
descriptive  writers,  I  could  not  hope  to  entirely 
escape  criticism.  If  these  letters  have  been  instruc- 
tive in  a  degree  to  awaken  enthusiasm,  loyalty, 
and  a  keener  patriotism  for  our  own  country,  her 
government  and  her  institutions,  this  shall  be  my 
greatest  reward.  Comparisons  furnish  a  basis  for  in- 
telligent opinions,  and  to  know  Europe  it  must  be 
seen.  No  unprejudiced  mind  will  fail  to  concede  to 
America  both  a  physical  growth  and  an  advancement 


204  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

in  all  things  which  contribute  to  the  highest  and  best 
interests  of  mankind  during  the  last  century,  which 
has  no  parallel  in  the  world's  history;  but  to  fully 
appreciate  this  a  trip  to  foreign  lands  is  almost  indis- 
pensable. If  the  laboring  men  of  this  country  could 
realize  the  difference  between  getting  a  dollar  in 
America,  and  getting  a  dollar  in  Europe,  especially 
on  the  continent,  and  the  value  of  that  dollar  in  com- 
parison— for  securing  a  home — there  would  be  less 
uneasiness  among  our  operatives.  If  the  young  men 
of  America  who  complain  of  lack  of  opportunities  for 
rising  in  the  world  could  be  made  to  believe  that  they 
are  absolute  masters  of  their  own  destinies,  while  the 
mass  of  the  young  men  of  Europe,  in  fact  of  all  the 
old  countries,  have  their  destinies  made  for  them, 
there  would  be  less  complaint.  Here  the  young  man 
with  correct  habits  and  industry,  if  he  is  frugal  and 
chaste,  has  little  to  fear,  and  his  aim  should  be  to 
become  a  partner  in  the  grand  opportunities  which 
are  being  spread  before  the  people  of  this  country. 
Every  true  American  will  take  pride  in  the  fact  that 
his  lot  is  cast  in  a  land  which  develops  its  interests  by 
the  exercise  of  brain-power,  quick  blood  and  wise 
statutory  provision.  We  have  demonstrated  that 
American  skill  and  enterprise  are  the  greatest  of  all  its 
great  resources.  This  country  has  absolutely  nothing 
to  fear  except  the'  operations,  or  machinations  of  a  set 
of  outcasts  of  the  old  world  which  have  been  dumped 
upon  us.  These  known  enemies  of  all  government,  of 
all  law,  of  education,  of  religion,  of  society  and  of 
everything  good  needs  prompt  attention.  Their 
power  for  mischief  should  not  be  minimized.  Their 


GIANTS'  CAUSEWAY.  205 

exaggerated  ideas  of  freedom  or  liberty  is  an  exotic 
growth.  Government  to  them  by  man  is  oppression, 
and  a  condition  of  confusion,  disaster  and  chaos  their 
aim.  There  is  no  room  in  America  for  anarchists,  or 
a  class  of  enemies  plotting  for  the  destruction  of  our 
government  by  assassination.  Since  the  murder  of 
President  McKinley — the  greatest  statesman,  and  the 
most  beloved  of  any  man  in  the  wide  world — we  are 
confronted  with  the  grave  question  that  has  long 
menaced  Russia,  of  whether  our  rulers  can  safely 
mingle  with  the  masses  of  the  people.  With  such 
rights  as  are  guaranteed  the  people  of  this  country,  no 
such  hazard  should  obtain  a  foothold.  Freedom  to 
enjoy  the  benefits  vouchsafed  by  our  fathers  must  be 
maintained.  That  three  of  the  last  seven  presidents 
elected  by  the  people  should  be  shot  to  death  is  a  per- 
manent blot  upon  American  history.  But  that  blot 
can  be  partially  removed  by  some  wholesome  laws  and 
their  prompt  and  vigorous  execution. 

Bidding  adieu  to  Europe  with  all  her  wealth,  her 
poverty,  her  antiquities  and  her  enchantments,  the 
morning  of  the  7th  of  September  found  us  aboard  of 
a  lighter  prepared  for  a  ride  down  the  Foyle  to 
Moville,  where  the  Astoria  was  anchored,  awaiting 
our  coming.  We  witnessed  the  parting  scenes  at  the 
Londonderry  dock,  where  the  sons  and  daughters 
were  taking  leave  of  their  parents.  Many  hot  tears 
were  shed,  some  of  the  old  people  completely  break- 
ing down  with  grief  at  the  loss  of  their  loved  ones. 
We  found  the  Astoria  of  the  Anchor  line,  a  500  footer, 
without  cargo,  and  with  500  passengers,  every  berth 
being  taken.  She  was  an  ordinary  ten-day  craft  with 


206  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

a  reputation  for  being  a  good  sailer  and  of  keeping 
her  nose  out  of  the  billows.  That  the  sunny  skies  and 
smooth  seas  which  favored  us  from  New  York  to 
Glasgow  were  not  to  be  enjoyed  on  our  return  trip 
was  soon  apparent.  But  fortunately  there  was  no  hint 
of  the  horrors  awaiting  us  (created  by  the  storm  at 
Galveston,  two  days  later).  On  Sunday  we  listened 
to  a  practical  sermon  by  Very  Reverend  Dean  Fair, 
of  Omaha,  a  venerable  and  much  respected  Episco- 
palian. 

Taking  an  account  of  stock  on  an  ocean  liner, 
when,  as  in  this  case,  the  passenger  list  is  full,  is  an 
amusement  offering  relief  to  the  undiversified  mono- 
tony. Friendships  were  quickly  made  on  shipboard, 
and  sets  were  readily  made  up.  All  professional  men 
have  a  way  of  finding  each  other.  They  might  be  seen 
in  groups,  discussing  topics  which  pertained  to  their 
respective  callings. 

The  gamblers  and  the  sporting  fraternity  were 
located  in  the  smoking-room,  generally  oblivious  to 
their  surroundings,  but  intent  upon  the  game  being 
played  for  profit.  The  flirtations  of  the  young  people 
occupying  the  decks,  especially  during  the  late  hours, 
offered  rare  entertainment  to  the  contingent,  which 
had  passed  to  the  sere  and  yellow  leaf.  For  solid 
enjoyment  the  steerage  passengers  took  the  lead  of  all 
others.  Although  deprived  of  nearly  every  comfort, 
their  numerous  songs  were  exuberant  and  often  musi- 
cal. Round  dances,  Irish  jigs,  music  on  the  violin  or 
banjo,  which  was  kept  up  during  their  waking  hours, 
was  a  source  of  delight  to  the  cabin  passengers. 

When  storms  overtook  the  ship  they  were  driven 


GIANTS'  CAUSEWAY.  207 

below  and  the  hatches  fastened  down.  During  these 
seasons  darkness  and  foul  air  must  be  contended  with, 
and,  although  deathly  sea-sickness  was  the  portion  of 
the  majority,  after  the  crisis  had  passed  they  came  up 
smiling  and  resumed  their  daily  rounds  of  hilarity. 
So-called  high  life  by  no  means  furnished  all  the  con- 
tentment or  all  the  philosophers  to  be  found  on  the 
Astoria. 

All  went  well  until  the  evening  of  the  12th,  when  a 
lurid  glare  at  sunset  portended  evil.  A  concert  in  the 
saloon  in  the  evening,  in  which  our  captain  took  a 
prominent  part,  was  disturbed  by  the  increasing  seas, 
and  at  ten  o'clock,  with  a  rapidly  falling  barometer,  a 
great  storm  was  imminent.  The  night  was  a  sleepless 
one ;  our  boat,  a  thousand  miles  from  New  York  and 
near  the  banks,  was  steered  straight  for  the  seas  (ever 
increasing  in  volume)  without  regard  to  our  destina- 
tion. The  morning  found  us  facing  a  sixty  mile 
breeze  or  hurricane.  What  would  under  moderate 
conditions  have  been  white  caps,  were,  by  force  of  the 
wind,  converted  into  mist,  and  drops  of  water,  filling 
the  air,  giving  the  impression  of  a  rain  storm,  when 
there  was  no  rain. 

There  is  something  grand,  majestic,  and  sublime 
in  the  broad  Atlantic,  when  conditions  are  favorable. 
When  water  is  not  disturbed  with  wind,  and  when 
sunshine  and  ripples  combine  to  produce  something 
similar  to  millions  of  sparkling  diamonds,  when  little 
rainbows  are  created  apparently  for  your  amusement, 
and  when  great  whales  spout  in  their  hilarity,  and 
schools  of  porpoises  take  their  evening  exercise,  leap- 
ing with  their  ten  foot  bodies  entirely  out  of  the  water, 


208  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

seemingly  to  furnish  you  entertainment ;  or  when  the 
six  day  floating  palaces  go  plowing  through  their 
3,000  miles  of  blue  water,  giving  you  a  sniff  of  their 
smoke  and  a  hint  of  this  progressive  age;  but  when 
every  drop  of  water  in  sight  has  become  angry,  when 
wind  and  water  have  combined  to  do  their  worst,  and 
you  are  placed  at  the  mercy  of  the  elements,  then  all 
conceit  leaves  you,  all  pride  vanishes,  and  you  are 
impressed  only  with  a  sense  of  your  weakness,  your 
helplessness  and  your  own  insignificance,  then  you 
feel  like  the  poet  who  exclaimed,  "Oh  why  should  the 
spirit  of  mortal  be  proud  ?" 

I  am  unable  to  paint  the  picture  presented  to  us  on 
the  morning  of  the  13th ;  language  is  inadequate. 
Photographs  of  storms  at  sea  fall  far  short  of  the  real 
thing,  as  they  lack  the  volume  and  scope  needed.  In 
this  case,  the  waves,  which  were  perhaps  fifty  feet 
high,  if  measured  perpendicularly,  measured  at  an 
angle  of  twenty-five  to  forty-five  degrees  meant  a 
sweep  of  hundreds  of  feet,  and  the  water  scooped  up 
by  the  hurricane  to  make  these  immense  seas  was 
taken  by  acres.  The  white  headed  billows  in  the  dis- 
tance, each  apparently  struggling  to  see  over  the  one 
in  front,  as  they  came  thundering  on,  forming  chasms, 
valleys,  hills,  mountains  and  precipices,  sometimes 
dashing  themselves  into  fragments,  and  sometimes 
uniting  with  other  billows  to  produce  a  monster  sea, 
leaving  in  its  wake  an  undulating  valley,  were  fright- 
ful and  awe-inspiring,  while  the  hurricane  at  sea  with 
its  surge  upon  surge,  is  a  rare  exhibition  of  power. 

The  track  of  the  cyclone  upon  land,  where  annihi- 
lation is  complete,  is  a  fearful  lesson  difficult  to  com- 


GIANTS'  CAUSEWAY.  209 

prehend,  as  the  work  of  the  unseen  is  over  in  one  brief 
moment.  At  sea  the  typhoon  lasting  for  hours, 
menacing  you  with  destruction,  toying  with  your 
fears  and  coquetting  with  your  emotions,  is  a  living, 
a  terrible,  ferocious  reality. 

The  forenoon  was  spent  in  riding  these  huge 
waves.  We  were  constantly  either  diving  down,  down 
into  these  great  valleys  of  water  with  the  stern  of  our 
boat  on  the  crest,  the  wheel  hoisted  entirely  out  of  the 
water,  or  we  were  crawling  at  a  sharp  angle  up  the 
side  of  the  mountain,  while  the  stern  was  down  in  the 
depths  surrounded  with  walls  of  water  and  foam. 

At  noon  the  wind  had  increased  to  eighty  miles  an 
hour,  the  terror  of  the  seas  each  apparently  intent 
upon  making  us  their  prey  was  too  fearful  to  look 
upon,  the  faces  of  strong  men  turned  away.  All  on 
board  realized  their  peril,  but  as  our  boat  had  for 
twelve  hours  successfully  ridden  the  storm,  we  hoped 
for  the  best.  Suddenly  the  engine  stopped,  the  heart 
which  had  furnished  the  life  to  our  craft  ceased  to 
beat.  Power  to  cope  with  the  elements  was  stilled. 
Word  was  immediately  passed  through  the  ship  that 
the  steering  gear  was  broken,  that  we  were  in  the 
trough  of  the  sea  helpless ;  this  we  realized  when  the 
rolling  of  the  boat  begun ;  when  side  walls  were  con- 
verted into  ceilings  and  ceilings  into  side  walls,  when 
the  side  rails,  which  in  still  water  were  twenty-four 
feet  from  the  level  of  the  sea,  dipped  into  the  foam, 
first  one  side  then  the  other,  when  the  spray  reached 
to  the  top  of  the  smokestacks,  when  everything  move- 
able  within  the  ship  seemed  to  be  alive,  when  waves 
dashed  across  the  deck,  when  trunks  left  the  state- 


210  GLIMPSES   OF   EUROPE. 

rooms  and  went  tumbling-  up  and  down  the  halls, 
when  crockery  by  the  bushel  was  being  smashed, 
when  every  joint  of  our  boat  creaked  and  shrieked  and 
groaned  as  if  in  agony,  and  when  every  passenger  who 
attempted  to  move  about  was  either  injured  by  falling 
or  had  a  narrow  escape,  and  the  ship's  surgeon  was 
kept  busy  binding  up  wounds. 

The  howling  of  the  tempest,  the  cry  of  the  sailors 
tightening  the  guys  to  the  smokestacks  to  keep  them 
from  blowing  away,  added  to  the  appalling  scene. 
At  the  end  of  two  hours,  in  which  the  passengers 
calmly  awaited  the  outcome,  the  repair  had  been 
made;  once  more  we  listened  to  the  throbs  of  the 
engine,  which  stopped  again  and  again,  and  each  time 
was  watched  with  all  the  intentsity  of  the  last  pulsa- 
tions of  a  dying  friend. 

Our  heroic,,  large-hearted  officers,  by  their  reas- 
suring words  had  prevented  a  panic,  and  now,  by  their 
good  management  righted  the  ship  and  we  again  rode 
the  seas  in  triumph.  A  few  hours  and  all  danger  was 
past. 

On  the  morning  of  the  16th  we  sighted  New  York 
harbor,  thankful  for  our  deliverance,  and  all  happy  at 
the  thought  of  landing  in  the  grandest  country  that 
the  sun  ever  shone  on. 


YB 


M309E87 


